o 

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:( 


A    BRAZILIAN    MYSTIC 

BEING  THE  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 
ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 


Uniform  with  this  Volume 

THE    BRAZILIANS    AND    THEIR 
COUNTRY. 

By  Clayton  Sedgwick  Cooper. 

CARTAGENA   AND    THE    BANKS 
OF  THE  SINU. 

By  R.  B.  CUNNiNGHAME  Graham. 


A 
BRAZILIAN    MYSTIC 

BEING 

THE    LIFE   AND    MIRACLES    OF 
ANTONIO    CONSELHEIRO 


BY 

R.   B.   CUNNINGHAME    GRAHAM 


'Adeus,  campo,  e  adeus  matto 
Adeus,  casa  onde  morei ! 
J  a"  que  &  fori,oso  partir 
Algum  dia  te  verei  !" 

Brazilian  Rhymt. 


NEW  YORK 
DODD,   MEAD   AND   COMPANY 

1920 


/.5  -^  ^ 

74^ 


Umversity  rj  Cslibrrta 
WlTHD^<AW^4 


TO 
MY  VALUED  FRIEND 


^  DON   JOSE    MARIA    BRACERAS 


in 


S 


I 


PREFACE 

Some  years  ago,  when  he  was  President,  after  having 
read  some  tales  of  mine  about  the  Gauchos,  the 
late  Colonel  Roosevelt  wrote  a  letter  to  me.  In  it  he 
said :  **  What  you  and  Hudson  have  done  for  South 
America,  many  have  done  for  our  frontiersmen  in 
Texas,  Arizona,  and  New  Mexico.  Others  have 
written  of  the  Mexican  frontiersmen,  and  written  well 
about  them.  No  one,  as  far  as  I  know,"  so  he  said, 
"  has  touched  the  subject  of  the  frontiersmen  of 
Brazil.  Why  don't  you  do  it  ?  for  you  have  been 
there,  know  them,  and  speak  their  lingo.  The  field 
is  open  to  you." 

I  was  duly  flattered  and  turned  the  question  over 
in  my  mind ;  then  forgot  all  about  it.  Things  of 
importance,  such  as  going  out  to  dinner  and  endeavour- 
ing to  arrive  neither  too  early  nor  too  late,  but  just 
exactly  to  descend  before  the  door  at  the  right  moment 
— that  is  to  say  two  or  three  minutes  before  eight — 
came  in  between  the  Brazilian  frontiersman  and  my 
memory,  as  they  are  apt  to  do  in  civilised  society, 
The  years  went  by,  with  each  one  certifying  his 
fellow  that  had  passed,  in  blameless  endeavour,  such 
as  that  I  have  described. 

Then  came  the  war,  and  on  my  passage  out  to 
Uruguay,  I  found  myself  one  morning  entering  the 
harbour  of  Bahia,  on  the  Brazilian  coast.     The  sea  was 


Vlll 


PREFACE 


oily ;  "  Portuguese  men-of-war  "  hoisted  their  fairy 
little  sails,  and  as  the  vessel  slowed  down  to  half  speed, 
passing  the  ruinous  old  fort  at  the  entrance  of  the 
bay,  backed  by  a  grove  of  coco-palms  looking  like 
ostrich  feathers,  she  put  up  shoals  of  flying  fish  that 
swept  along  the  surface  of  the  waves,  just  as  a  flock  of 
swallows  sweep  across  a  field. 

The  red-roofed  city,  with  its  spires  and  convents, 
its  tall  old  houses,  those  in  the  lower  part  reaching  up 
almost  to  the  foundations  of  the  houses  on  the  cliflf, 
was  unrolled,  as  it  were,  in  a  gigantic  cinematograph 
as  the  ship  steamed  into  the  bay.  Eight  or  ten 
German  vessels  were  interned  and  rode  at  anchor, 
blistering  in  the  sun.  Fleets  of  the  curious  catamarans, 
known  as  jangadas  in  Brazil,  were  making  out  to  sea. 
Their  occupants  sat  upon  a  little  stool,  on  the  three 
logs  that  constitute  the  embarkation,  with  feet  almost 
awash,  whilst  the  white-pointed  little  sails  gave  the 
jangadas  an  air  of  copying  the  nautiluses. 

Myriads  of  islands  dotted  the  surface  of  the  vast 
inlet,  the  houses  on  them  painted  sky-blue  and  pink 
or  a  pale  yellow  colour.  So  fair  the  scene  was 
from  the  vessel's  deck,  it  seemed  that  one  had  come 
into  a  land  so  peaceful  that  it  was  quite  impossible 
there  could  exist  in  it  evil  or  malice,  hatred  and  envy, 
or  any  of  the  vices  or  the  crimes  that  curse  humanity. 
One  understood  the  feelings  of  the  apostles  when  they 
wished  to  build  their  tabernacles  ;  only  the  difficulty  of 
finding  an  Elias  or  a  Moses  worth  while  to  build  a 
shanty  for,  restrained  one  from  incontinently  taking 
up  some  land  and  starting  in  to  build. 

I  stood  still  gazing,   when  a  voice  beside  me  broke 


PREFACE  ix 

the  spell,  bringing  me  back  again  to  reality,  or  the 
illusion  of  reality  that  we  delude  ourselves  is  life. 

"  Friend  Don  Roberto,"  said  the  voice,  "  what 
things  have  happened  in  Bahia!  and  that  not  long  ago. 
Scarcely  two  hundred  miles  from  where  we  stand 
took  place  the  rising  of  Antonio  Conselheiro,  the  last 
of  the  Gnostics,  who  defied  all  the  Brazilian  forces  for 
a  year  or  so,  and  was  eventually  slain  with  all  his 
followers.  The  episode  took  place  not  more  than  five- 
and-twenty  years  ago  ;  you  ought  to  read  and  then  to 
write  about  it,  for  it  was  made  by  Providence  on 
purpose  for  you,  and  is  well  fitted  to  your  pen." 

I  turned  and  saw  my  friend  Braceras  standing  by  my 
side,  dressed  in  immaculate  white  duck.  He  wore 
a  jipi-japa  hat,  that  must  have  cost  him  at  the  least  a 
hundred  dollars.  His  small  and  well-arched  feet, 
encased  in  neat  buckskin  shoes,  showed  him  a  Spaniard 
of  the  Spaniards  from  old  Castile,  just  where  it 
borders  on  Vizcaya,  and  the  race  is  purest  of  the  pure. 
He  had  the  easy  manners  and  the  complete  immunity 
from  self-preoccupation  that  makes  a  man  the  equal 
of  a  king,  and  just  as  much  at  home  with  fishermen, 
with  cattle-drovers,  or  any  other  class  of  men,  as  if  he 
were  one  of  them.  His  hands  were  nervous,  and  his 
blue-black  hair  was  just  beginning  to  turn  grey,  whilst 
his  dark  eyes,  his  bushy  eyebrows,  and  his  closely- 
shaven  face,  gave  him  the  look  of  an  ecclesiastic, 
though  not  of  those  whose  function  is  but  to  say  Mass 
and  eat  his  dinner,  as  the  old  adage  goes.  The  name 
of  Conselheiro  was  known  to  me  but  vaguely,  although 
I  knew  religious  movements  had  been  continuous  in 
Brazil  since  the  discovery.     I  listened  to  the  story,  and, 


X  .  PREFACE 

when  we  landed  at  the  capital,  bought  books  about  it, 
bought  more  in  Santos,  and  as  I  read  and  mused  upon 
the  tale,  the  letter  from  the  President  came  back  into 
my  mind. 

The  events  all  happened  in  the  wild  region  known 
as  the  Sertao,*  lying  between  the  States  of  Pernambuco 
and  Bahia,  unknown,  I  take  it,  geographically,  to 
ninety-nine  per  cent,  of  educated  men. 

The  followers  of  Antonio  Conselheiro  were,  almost 
to  a  man,  what  are  known  as  Jagun9os,  a  term 
invented  for  the  most  prominent  of  the  cattle  men  who 
live  in  the  Sertao,  and  signifying  something  between  a 
bully  and  a  fighting-cock,  and  by  degrees  applied  to 
all  of  them,  as  the  term  Gaucho  is  in  Argentina, 
Guaso  in  Chile,  and  Llanero  in  the  vast,  grassy  plains 
upon  the  Orinoco,  to  the  same  class  of  man.  'Tis 
true  they  did  not  live  upon  a  frontier,  except  the  ever- 
shifting  barrier  between  the  old  world  and  the  new,  or 
that  which  just  as  constantly  is  changing  its  position 
and  its  course,  betwixt  our  modern  life  and  medievalism. 
Still,  these  are  frontiers  just  as  well  marked  indeed  as 
those  that  arbitrarily  separate  two  countries — in  fact, 
are  really  better  far  defined.  As  I  read  on  about  the 
semi-Gnostic  and  his  adventures  of  the  spirit,  and 
the  adventurous  lives  his  followers  led,  although  they 
too,  or  most  of  them,  were  deeply  tinged  with  either 
superstition  or  religion — for  who  shall  say  where  the 
one  ends  and  his  twin  brother  starts  ? — I  felt  Braceras 

*  SertSo  may  be  translated  "  highlands,"  though  that  does  not 
entirely  give  the  sense  of  the  word,  which  infers  what  we  call  "back- 
lying  "  in  Scotland.     It  is  a  high  plateau,  covered  with  scrub. 

The  mark  over  the  "a,"  called  "til"  in  Portuguese,  gives 
a  nasal  sound,  almost  as  if  the  word  were  written  "  Sertawn." 


PREFACE  xi 

had  been  right  in  what  he  said  about  the  subject,  and 
of  the  interest  it  contained. 

The  life  in  the  material  sense  was  simple  :  but  in  its 
background  there  was  evidence  of  faith  of  a  peculiar 
kind,  tinged  with  fanaticism.  Their  faith,  as  often 
happens,  but  little  influenced  their  daily  lives,  which 
were  passed  in  the  open  air  on  horseback,  herding 
their  cattle,  dressed  in  their  deerskin  clothes. 

As  I  wrote  of  it,  looking  at  the  drops  of  moisture 
coursing  down  the  window-panes  (for  it  was  autumn 
in  the  north  when  I  began  to  write),  1  used  to  wonder 
if  the  sun  was  shining  in  Brazil,  as  I  remembered  it, 
for  I  could  see  the  sodden  stooks  of  corn  out  in  the 
fields,  with  the  rain  falling  on  them,  and  on  the  ships 
in  the  strait,  fairway  channel  as  they  crept  up  and 
down  the  Clyde. 

Although  Antonio  Conselheiro  had  paid  the 
penalty  of  his  credulity  or  faith,  I  felt  the  wild 
life  in  the  Sertao  was  going  on  as  usual,  and  the 
vaqueiros  were  galloping  about,  with  their  long,  iron- 
shod  cattle-goads  sloped  forward,  just  as  of  old  the 
men  of  Annandale  carried  their  rusty  spears. 

I  fancied  I  could  see  them  land  upon  their  feet  like 
cats,  when  a  horse  fell  with  them,  just  as  once,  long  ago 
in  Entre  Rios,  I  saw  a  man  fall  suddenly  and  come 
off  running,  unharmed,  although  his  horse  had  its 
neck  dislocated.  A  pity,  too,  because  the  horse,  a 
little  "  gateado,"  if  I  remember  rightly,  was  one  that 
you  could  turn  upon  a  hide  in  Gaucho  phrase;  and 
for  the  man — your  damned  bronchitis  took  him  off, 
and  he  died  slovenly,  within  a  month  or  two. 

This  kind  of  book   is  bound  to  find  its  way,  and 


xii  PREFACE 

shortly,  to  an  old  bookstall,  there  to  be  sold  with  other 
bargains  for  a  penny,  after  the  fashion  of  the  sparrows 
in  the  Holy  Scriptures,  for  it  treats  of  unfamiliar 
people  and  of  a  life  unknown  and  unsuspected  by  the 
general.  It  is  no  matter,  for  he  who  writes  a  book 
writes  for  his  own  peculiar  pleasure,  and  if  he  does 
not,  he  had  better  far  abstain  from  writing,  for  that 
which  pleases  not  the  writer  of  the  work  can  scarce 
please  anybody. 

If  it  is  fated  that  my  account  of  the  Jagun9o  mystic 
should  lie  rotting  in  the  rain  upon  a  stall,  so  be  it,  for 
so  it  was  decreed ;  though  it  were  better  fitting  it 
should  cockle  in  the  sun  and  shrivel  up,  just  as  a  dead 
body  shrivels  up  in  the  dry  air  of  the  Sertao. 

Shrivel  or  rot,  it  is  all  one  to  me.  Just  as  the 
struggle  is  the  thing  worth  struggling  for  and  the 
result  a  secondary  affair,  so  is  the  writing  of  a  book 
what  matters  to  the  writer  of  it,  for  he  has  had  his 
fight. 

If  it  but  please  himself  he  has  his  public  and  his 
reward  assured,  in  regions  where  the  rain  cannot 
offend  him,  and  where  the  fiercest  sun  that  ever  blazed 
upon  the  sand  is  tempered  pleasantly. 

R.  B.  CUNNINGHAME  GRAHAM. 
Ardoch,  19 1 9. 


A  BRAZILIAN    MYSTIC 

BEING  THE  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 
ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 


INTRODUCTION 

What  is  called  the  Sertao"^  of  the  Brazilian  provinces 
of  Pernambuco  and  Bahia  is  one  of  the  most  curious 
regions  of  South  America.  It  is  also  one  of  the  least 
known  to  the  outside  world. 

Life  goes  on  there  much  as  it  has  gone  on  for  the 
last  three  hundred  years.  The  people  mostly  are 
engaged  in  cattle  farming,  and  live  on  horseback. 
They  dress  in  leather,  on  account  of  the  dense  scrub ; 
their  daily  lives  are  hard  and  perilous ;  religion 
occupies  a  chief  place  in  their  minds. 

The  two  provinces  of  Bahia  and  Pernambuco  meet 
in  the  vague  region  of  the  Sertao,  an  elevated  plateau 
between  two  thousand  and  three  thousand  feet  in 
height,  backed  by  more  or  less  pronounced  ranges  of 
mountains  or  of  hills,  whose  distance  from  the  coast 
rarely  exceeds  two  hundred  or  two  hundred  and  fifty 
miles.  This  plateau  has  a  climate  and  a  flora  of  its 
own,  the  former  ranging  from  great  extremes  of  heat 
to  a  considerable  degree  of  cold,  taking  into  considera- 
tion the  latitude  in  which  it  lies. 

*  Sertao  is  a  word  hardly  possible  to  translate  except  by  a  peri- 
phrasis.    It  means  "  wooded,  back-lying  highlands." 

I 


2  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

The  flora  chiefly  consists  of  thorny  trees  and  plants, 
Icnown  in  Brazil  as  "  caatinga,"  a  Tupi  word  signifying 
"  bush  or  scrub." 

The  country  gradually  rises  from  the  coast  to  the 
plateau  of  the  Sertao,  and  the  climate,  vegetation,  and 
soil  of  it  are  all  widely  different  from  those  of  the 
littoral  districts. 

All  these  conditions,  together  with  the  isolation 
in  which  they  have  lived  for  three  hundred  years, 
have  left  their  impress  on  the  population,  making  them 
a  race  apart — a  race  of  centaurs,  deeply  imbued  with 
fanaticism,  strong,  honest,  revengeful,  primitive,  and 
refractory  to  modern  ideas  and  life  to  an  extraordinary 
degree.  Their  existence  centres,  and  has  always  done 
so,  round  their  cattle,  for  the  Sertao  is  little  fitted  for 
most  kinds  of  agriculture.  The  arid  nature  of  the 
soil,  the  long-continued  droughts,  the  extraordinary 
difference  of  the  temperature  between  the  day  and 
night,  all  tend  to  make  the  Sertanejos  (i.e.,  the  inhabi- 
tants of  the  Sertao)  a  people  set  apart  from  all  the 
world.  Their  ancestors,  when  they  left  Portugal, 
had  just  emerged  from  their  long  contest  with  the 
Moors.  To  them,  religion  was  not  a  faith  only,  but  a 
mark  of  race — a  rallying-point,  a  war-cry,  and  a  bond 
uniting  them  to  one  another,  in  a  way  difficult  for 
modern  men  to  understand.  With  us  religion  is 
a  personal  thing  ;  we  take  it,  according  to  our  indi- 
vidual temperament,  in  many  differing  ways.  Some, 
not  the  highest  minds,  look  on  it  as  a  sort  of  mumbo- 
jumbo  whereby  to  save  their  souls.  Others,  again, 
regard  it  as  a  means  whereby  life  is  ennobled,  death's 
terrors  exorcised,  and  the  world  improved. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  3 

The    Portuguese,  when   they  set   out    to   colonise 
Brazil,  I   fancy,  looked  at  religion   chiefly  from  the 
point   of  view    of  nationality.     If  you  were  a   true 
Portuguese,  white  on  all  four  sides,  as  ran  the  saying, 
you  were  a  Christian.     You  could  not  be  otherwise, 
for  Jews  and  Moors  and  other  infidel  were  all  the 
enemies,  both  of  the  true  faith  and  of  your  native  land. 
Although  the  Portuguese  held  the  same  iron  faith  as 
did  the  Spaniards  of  those  times,  yet  in  their  nature 
there  was   a  vein   of   almost   northern  mysticism — a 
belief  in  fairies,  spirits  of  the  night  and  of  the  moun- 
tain, a  fear  of  werwolves,  and  a  sort  of  sentimentalism, 
especially  to  be  observed  in  the  two  northern  provinces, 
in  which   the  Celtic  strain  of  blood  was  most  pre- 
dominant.    Thus  were  the  people,  both   by  descent 
and  by  their  isolated  life,  especially  susceptible  to  wild 
religious  creeds,  and  were,  in  fact,  in  point  of  faith, 
mental    equipment,  and  religious    temperament,   not 
very  much  unlike  some  of  the  Gnostic  sects  in  Asia 
Minor    in    the    first    and    second    centuries.      In    the 
fashion  of  the  Gnostic  sects,  the  people  of  the  Sertao 
looked  to  no  central  authority.     Their  parish  priest,  to 
them,  was  Pope,  Council,  and  Father  of  the  Church. 
There  might  be  greater,  or  as   great,  authorities  in 
what  they  called  "  as  terras  grandes"  {i.e.,  the  great  or 
foreign  lands);  but  they  looked  on  them  just  as  one 
looks    on    death,   as    something    terrible    and   vague, 
although  not  imminent. 

These  kind  of  folk,  so  to  speak,  culminated  in 
the  State  of  Bahia,  for  it  is  there  that  they  have 
always  manifested  their  most  peculiar  traits.  The 
territory    is    immense,    bounded    on    the    north    by 


4  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

the  province  of  Sergipe  del  Rey  and  Pernambuco, 
on  the  south  by  Porto  Seguro  and  Minas  Geraes, 
on  the  west  by  Pernambuco,  from  which  the  Rio  Sao 
Francisco  separates  it,  and  on  the  east  by  the  Atlantic 
Ocean.  It  lies  entirely  in  the  tropics,  from  io°  to  16" 
south  latitude,  and  is  about  three  hundred  and  fifty 
miles  in  length  by  about  two  hundred  and  forty  broad. 

Such  a  vast  extent  of  territory  has  given  room 
for  the  inhabitants  of  the  Sertao  to  form  a  world 
entirely  of  their  own. 

Brazil,  at  the  time  of  the  conquest,  was  divided  into 
captaincies  (capitanias)^  great  tracts  of  land  having  been 
given  to  men  styled  "  donatories."  The  first  event  in 
the  history  of  the  State  of  Bahia  is  the  shipwreck 
of  Diogo  Alvarez  Correa,  a  man  destined  to  play 
a  curious  role  in  the  new  land  to  which  his  ship 
was  bound.  No  certainty  exists  as  to  the  date, 
except  a  passage  in  Herrera,  one  of  the  historians 
of  the  Indies,  in  which  he  says,  speaking  of  the 
shipwreck  of  two  Spanish  vessels  that  left  San  Lucar 
de  Barrameda,  in  September,  1534,  and  were  wrecked 
on  the  Brazilian  coast  in  1635  :  "  Here  they  found  a 
Portuguese  who  said  that  there  were  five-and-twenty 
years  he  had  been  amongst  the  Indians."* 

This  Portuguese,  one  Diogo  Alvarez  Correa,  had  by 
the  time  that  he  was  found,  after  his  long  residence 
amongst  the  Indians,  become  a  man  of  note.  His 
name  amongst  them  was  Caramaru,  which  is  in- 
terpreted "  the  man  of  fire  " —  a  title  that  he  had 
acquired  by  having  brought  a  gun  ashore  with  him. 

*  "  Onde  hallaron  un  Portuguez  qvie  dixo  que  avia  veyente  y  cinco 
anos  que  estaua  entre  los  Indies." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  5 

Henderson,  in  his  "History  of  Brazil,"*  says  that  in 
his  time  (1821)  a  man  still  living  at  Port  Seguro  had 
in  his  possession  an  old  manuscript  which  affirms  that 
Caspar  de  Lemos,  one  of  the  first  discoverers  of  Brazil, 
upon  a  voyage  back  to  Portugal,  entered  the  River 
Ilheos,  near  Bahia,  landed,  and  w^as  suddenly  attacked 
by  Indians.  Correa,  one  of  his  crevs^,  had  no  time  to 
re-embark,  and  thus  remained  amongst  the  savages. 
As  he  had  married  many  times  and  oft,  amongst  the 
Indians,  and  spoke  their  language,  he  v^as  a  valuable 
man  to  find. 

In  the  wrecked  Spanish  vessel  came  the  first 
donatory,  one  Francisco  Peyreya  Coutinho,  a  person- 
age of  rank.  Coutinho  was  a  Portuguese  fidalgo-f- — 
i.e.,  a  nobleman  who  had  but  recently  returned  from 
India,  where  he  had  served  with  honour  and  rendered 
important  services  to  the  State.  The  King,  Don 
John  III.,  having  divided  all  Brazil  into  capitanias, 
granted  Coutinho  all  the  country  lying  between  the 
point  of  Padrao,  now  known  as  San  Antonio  and  the 
River  San  Francisco,  together  with  the  Reconcava  of 
Bahia — i.e.,  the  greater  part  of  the  extensive  bay. 

This  gentleman  fitted  out  his  expedition  after 
the  fashion  of  the  times.  As  his  first  action  was,  after 
having  run  up  a  stockade,  to  build  a  church,  quite 
evidently  he  understood  the  full  force  of  the  proverb, 
*'  Pray  to  God,  but  strike  home  with  the  mace."  J  His 
expedition  comprised  a  chaplain,  what  in  those  days 
were  known  as  reformed — i.e..,  retired — soldiers,  and 

*  Henderson,  "  History  of  Brazil,"  London,  1821,  p.  310. 
t  Fidftlgo — literally  "a  son  of  somebody,  or  of  something." 
X  A  Dios  rogando,  y  con  la  maza  dando. 


6  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

many  men  of  wealth.  Brazil  being  a  tropical  country, 
and  the  Portuguese  never  having  held  the  Spanish 
views  upon  the  ignominy  of  commerce,  and  being  less 
set  on  finding  gold  mines,  and  on  the  whole  far  less 
ferocious  in  their  desire  to  save  the  souls  of  the  poor 
Indians,  nearly  all  the  donatories  embarked  in  sugar 
planting.  Coutinho  did  the  same,  and  all  seemed 
flourishing  for  several  years.  They  built  a  chapel 
on  the  site,  where  now  stands  the  hermitage  of  Our 
Lady  of  the  Victories. 

Negroes  were  unprocurable,  as  the  slave  trade  in 
Brazil  only  began  in  1574. 

The  climate  made  field  labour  for  white  men 
almost  impossible,  although  the  Portuguese  did  not 
look  down  upon  all  manual  toil,  after  the  Spanish  way. 
Still,  labour  was  essential  for  their  sugar  fields,  so  they 
began  to  make  the  Indians  slaves.  No  race  of  men 
in  all  the  world  was  less  inclined  to  sit  down  quietly  in 
a  slavish  state  than  were  the  Indians  of  Brazil.  Thus 
war  was  certain  from  the  first,  though  the  first  settlers 
never  understood  the  race.  One  thing  is  to  the  credit 
of  the  Portuguese  :  they  seem  to  have  made  no  pre- 
tence about  the  glory  of  the  Lord  as  did  the  Spaniards, 
in  like  circumstances.  So  when  they  made  a  man  a 
slave  they  did  not  trouble  overmuch  about  his  soul. 

Still,  they  were  not  entirely  free  from  the  ideas  that 
influenced  their  age,  and  always  took  a  good  store  of 
priests  and  friars  with  them  to  all  their  conquests — 
perhaps  as  a  precaution,  or  perhaps  from  habit,  or 
because  it  was  enjoined  upon  them  by  their  Govern- 
ment. In  all  the  conquests  of  Brazil  the  Jesuits  took 
a  considerable  share. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  7 

Vincente  Moreira,  Treasurer  to  Our  Lord  the 
King  of  Portugal,  in  a  report  he  makes  to  Mem  de  Sa, 
Governor  of  Brazil,  laments  that  a  chief  of  the  Indians, 
whom  he  calls  Wry-Mouth  (Boca  Torta)^  refused  to  give 
up  eating  human  flesh,  so  that  the  Government  v^«s 
forced  to  march  against  him  and  burn  his  village,  and 
after  burning  it,  and  killing  many  of  the  enemy,  ordered 
the  Jesuit  father  to  build  a  church  wherein  mass  could 
be  said,  the  doctrine  taught,  with  reading,  writing,  and 
other  good  customs. ""^ 

Still,  the  Portuguese  seem  to  have  kept  their 
punitive  expeditions,  as  we  should  call  them  nowadays, 
and  their  endeavours  to  introduce  "  good  customs  " 
and  a  knowledge  of  their  faith,  apart  from  one 
another.  We  never  read,  in  Brazil  at  least,  of  a  single 
instance  of  a  conqueror  who,  as  Cortes  in  Mexico,  was 
even  more  eager  than  the  priests  to  bring  the  Indian 
flock  into  the  fold.  The  usual  treatment  of  the 
natives  by  Coutinho  and  his  followers  was  bound  to 
bring  the  usual  results.  The  Indians  broke  into  revolt. 
Most  of  the  territory  now  comprised  in  the  State  of 
Bahia  was  at  that  time  inhabited  by  a  tribe  of  Indians 
called  Tupinambas,  f  a  fierce  and  war-like  tribe.  They 
spread  at  one  time  over  nearly  all  the  coastal  districts 
of  Brazil.  Their  language  was  nearly  allied  to 
Guarani,  as  spoken  by  the  Paraguayans  to-day.  J  Their 

*  "E  leer  e  escrever  e  outras  boas  costumes." — Vincente 
Monteiro  Tezoureiro  del  Rey  Nosso  senhor,  in  a  report  to  Mem  de 
Sa,  Governor  of  Brazil,  in  the  "  Documentos  relativos  a  Mem  de  Sa," 
published  in  the  "  Annaes  da  Bibliotheca  Nacional,  do  Rio  de  Janeiro," 
vol.  xxvii.,  p.  194. 

t  These  Indians  were  a  branch  of  the  great  Tupi  race. 

X  Guarani  and  Tupi  are  closely  allied  tongues,  and  in  general 
nearly  all  the  place-names  in  that  vast  territory  are  in  these  languages. 


8  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

place-names  are  almost  identical.  Anyone  with  a 
smattering  of  Guarani  can  make  out  most  of  the  place- 
names  in  the  province  of  Bahia,  apart  from  those  in 
Portuguese,  given  by  the  conquerors.  The  Tupi- 
nambas  seem  to  have  been  fiercer  and  more  v^'^arlike 
than  the  Guaranis  of  Paraguay.  Above  all  things, 
they  were  hardy  and  enduring  to  an  extraordinary 
degree.  These  qualities  they  have  transmitted  to  the 
Sertanejos  of  Bahia,  most  of  whom  have  a  tinge  of 
Indian  blood.  The  Tupinambas,  or,  to  be  accurate,  the 
Tupiniquin  Indians,  most  probably  a  branch  of  the 
more  well-known  tribe,  soon  grew  sick  of  continued 
work ;  and  the  very  probable  injustices  they  had  to 
suffer  at  the  hands  of  Coutinho  and  his  colonists, 
especially,  we  may  suppose,  the  forced  introduction  of 
"  good  customs,"  always  so  disagreeable  both  to  the 
Indian  and  the  white  man  alike,  drove  them  into 
revolt.  They  carried  on  for  six  or  seven  years  a  long- 
drawn-out  warfare  with  the  intruders  on  their  lands. 

This  warfare  had  all  the  well-known  characteristics 
of  colonial  wars.  The  Indians  attacked  by  night,  and 
burned  the  sugar  factories.  They  cut  off  small  bodies 
of  the  Portuguese,  whom  they  surprised.  No  doubt, 
now  and  then,  they  massacred  the  settlers  ;  at  any  rate, 
they  made  the  colony  untenable.     Coutinho  had  to 


Early  in  the  history  of  Brazil,  and  perhaps  even  before  the  conquest, 
Tupi  became  the  general  means  of  communication.  It  is  now  much 
mixed  with  Portuguese — for  instance,  as  to  numerals,  for  the  Tupis 
only  counted  up  to  five. 

It  is  "  A  Lingoa  Geral "  (the  General  Language),  and  it  is  supposed 
was  so  used  by  the  varying  tribes  from  remote  ages.  It  runs  from 
the  southern  part  of  the  Orinoco  to  Paraguay  and  the  Argentine 
province  of  Corrientes. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  9 

re-embark  with  all  his  men,  taking  with  him  Correa 
as  interpreter.  Driven  ashore  by  a  violent  gale,  not  far 
from  the  entrance  to  the  harbour  of  Bahia,  they  were 
attacked,  slaughtered  and  eaten,  for  the  tribe  into 
whose  hands  they  fell  were  cannibals.  Correa- 
Caramaru  escaped,  owing  to  his  knowledge  of  the 
Indian  tongue. 

Eventually,  by  way  of  matrimony,  often  continued 
and  well  thought  out,  we  may  suppose,  as  regards  the 
rank  and  circumstances  of  his  brides'  families,  he 
became  a  prince.  His  offspring,  the  Jesuit  Vascon- 
cellos,^  who  wrote  his  life,  informs  us,  were  numerous, 
and  it  is  said  that  many  families  of  Bahia  still  trace 
their  ancestry  to  the  "  man  with  the  gun." 

Caramaru — Correa's  head  wife,  the  daughter  of  an 
Indian  chief,  baptised;  as  Donna  Catharina — sleeps  in 
the  suburb  of  Victoria,  in  the  Church  of  Our  Lady  of 
Grace.  She  accompanied  her  husband  to  Europe, 
where  he  must  have  been  as  much  at  sea  after  so  many 
years  of  Indian  life  as  she  was  herself.  Her  baptism 
took  place  in  Paris.  At  it  she  relinquished  her 
Indian  name  of  Paraguassu,  and  took  that  of  the 
Queen  of  France. 

This  Indian  lady,  worthy  to  be  placed  beside 
Pocahontas  in  the  roll  of  fame,  has  the  following 
epitaph  upon  her  tomb  :  "  This  is  the  sepulchre-f-  of 
Donna  Catharina  Alvarez,  Lady  of  this  Captaincy  of 

*  This  author  did  not  write  till  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  after 
Caramaru's  death,  but  I  see  no  reason  to  doubt  his  word  or  his  facts. 

t  "  Sepultura  de  Dona  Catharina  Alvarez,  Senhora  desta  Capitania 
da  Bahia,  a  qual  ella,  a  seu  marido  Diogo  Alvarez  Correa,  natural  de 
Vianna,  deram  uos  Senhores  Reys  de  Portugal,  fez,  e  deu  esta  Capella 
ao  Patriarca  St.  Bento,  Anno  de  1582." 


lo  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Bahia,  which  she  and  her  husband,  Diogo  Alvarez 
Correa,  a  native  of  Vianna,  gave  to  the  Kings  of  Por- 
tugal, and  built  and  gave  this  chapel  to  the  Patriarch 
St.  Bento,  in  the  year  1582." 

None  of  Correa's  other  wives  left  epitaphs. 

He  himself  lived  to  a  ripe  old  age,  and  in  the  year 
1549  he  welcomed  Thome  de  Sousa,  the  new  Captain- 
General,  and  lodged  him  and  his  followers  in  his 
village,  whilst  a  new  settlement,  now  the  City  of 
Bahia,  was  being  built. 

Donna  Catharina's  Indian  name,  Paraguassu,  is  that 
of  the  river  near  which  she  was  born.  Her  husband's 
birthplace  is  a  delightful  little  town  in  Portugal,  in 
the  province  of  the  Minho,  not  very  far  from  Spain. 
It  stands,  the  houses  clustering  round  the  beautiful, 
flamboyant  Igreja  Matriz,  a  mine  of  old-world  and 
arcaded  streets,  all  paved  with  cobble  stones.  The 
River  Lima,  which  the  Roman  soldiers  took  for 
Lethe,  washes  its  walls.*  Although  Correa  had 
drunk  its  waters  in  his  childhood,  he  found  those  of 
the  Paraguassu  more  potent,  and  laid  his  bones  far 
from  the  river  of  his  youth. 

Diogo  Correa-Caramaru  and  Paraguassu-Catharina 
were  thus  the  originators  of  the  race  that  was  to  have 
so  large  a  share  in  the  destiny,  not  only  of  Bahia,  but 
of  all  Brazil.  The  Indians  that  the  Portuguese  found 
living  upon  the  land  were  no  less  hardy  and  warlike 
than  themselves. 

*  Lucius  Junius  Brutus  had  to  plunge  into  it,  carrying  his  standard, 
to  induce  his  soldiers  to  cross  it.     The  poet  Diogo  Bernardes  says  : 

"Junto  do  Lima,  claro  e  fresco  rio 
Que  Lethe  se  chamou  antiguamente." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  ii 

The  first  cross — i.e.,  the  cross  between  the  white  and 
Indian — is  known  throughout  Brazil  as  a  "  Mesti9o," 
— i.e.,  a  half-breed.  The  introduction  of  the  negro 
brought  another  cross  and  opened  the  way  to  a  be- 
wildering number  of  half  and  quarter  breeds  between 
the  different  races  of  Indians,  negroes,  and  the  whites. 

These  in  Brazil  go  under  many  names,  not  very 
easy  to  keep  apart  and  to  distinguish  by  the  foreigner. 
Though  the  colours  blend  into  one  another,  the  in- 
finite variety  of  gradations  tends  to  bring  about  one  or 
two  separate  types.  As  a  general  rule,  it  may  be  said 
that  the  Mulatto,  the  cross  between  the  negro  and  the 
white,  presents  a  type  of  man,  strong,  bulky,  and 
robust,  but  indolent  and  unprogressive,  with  a  strong 
tendency  to  religious  fervour.  This  type  is  generally 
to  be  found  in  the  coast  districts  and  rarely  penetrates 
to  the  Sertao. 

The  Mamaluco,  called  also  Curiboca,  is  the  half- 
breed  between  the  white  and  Indian. 

Lastly,  the  Cafuz  is  the  result  of  interbreeding 
between  the  negro  and  the  Indian,  generally  the 
Indian  of  the  Tupi  race. 

The  names  of  Curiboca  and  Mamaluco  are  of 
Indian  origin,  and  are  derived  from  Tupi  words  :  in 
the  first  instance,  "  Curiboc  "  {i.e.,  proceeding  from 
the  white),  and  in  the  second,  "  Mamaluco,"  from 
"  mama  "  to  mix  and  "  rucca  "  to  draw.  All  these 
strange  names  are  further  complicated  by  the  term 
"Caboclo,"  generally  used  of  Indians  who  have  attained 
to  some  degree  of  civilisation,  but  often  merely 
to  designate  a  rustic,  country  fellow. 

All    these  three  divisions  have  bred  and  interbred. 


12  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

and  keep  on  doing  so  ;  but  in  the  long  run  the  white 
blood  generally  prevails.  The  Mamaluco  and  Cafuz 
are  seldom  seen  upon  the  coast,  and  it  is  from  their 
ranks  that  the  interior  has  been  chiefly  populated. 
Just  as  the  Mulatto  usually  is  gay  and  temperamental, 
so  is  the  Curiboca  almost  always  taciturn,  fanatical  in 
his  religious  beliefs,  steadfast  in  all  his  doings,  a  cruel 
enemy,  and  an  equally  stanch  friend. 

Though  not  so  powerful  in  a  single  effort  as  the 
Mulatto,  he  is  incredibly  enduring  of  all  kinds  of  hard- 
ships. His  frame  is  light  and  active,  his  beard  sparse, 
his  speech  slow  and  measured,  and  he  is  not  without 
traces  of  ferocity,  even  of  cruelty  in  his  composition, 
inherited  with  his  Indian  blood. 

The  Cafuz,  known  in  the  Spanish  republics  as  the 
Zambo,  is  the  lowest  of  the  three  types.  Not  lacking 
in  physical  strength  or  energy,  his  mental  outlook  is 
not  infrequently  backward  and  savage,  and  his  features 
often  squat  and  simian-looking.  Roughly,  it  may  be 
said  that  all  three  types  afford  a  better  field  for  the 
religious  enthusiast  or  agitator  to  work  upon  than  any 
to  be  met  with  throughout  America.  The  agitation 
or  enthusiasm,  however,  never  exceeds  the  limits 
of  the  Catholic  Church,  and  all  the  jarring  sects,  so 
common  in  the  United  States,  are  quite  unknown  in 
any  portion  of  Brazil. 

Such  movements  as  have  arisen  in  Brazil — and  they 
have  been  extremely  numerous — have  always  been 
what  one  may  style  revolutions  of  the  interior  grace,  to 
use  a  theological  term,  rather  than  of  forms  of  Church 
government  or  of  the  right  of  individual  interpretation 
of  the  Scriptures,  such  as  have  generally  given  rise  to 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  13 

the  myriad  sects  amongst  the  EngHsh  and  Americans. 
As  the  repeated  crossings  and  intercrossings  of  the 
three  races  have  produced  a  type  of  man,  neither 
all  Indian  nor  all  white,  but  with  a  certain  strain 
of  negro  blood  who  has  become  the  inhabitant  of 
the  Sertoes,*  slight,  active,  olive-coloured,  and  with 
abundant  hair  and  scanty  beard,  so  have  they  formed 
a  type  of  mind  highly  receptive  of  religious  mania. 
"  Towards  the  production  of  this  physical  and  moral 
type,  undoubtedly  the  strange  nature  of  the  country, 
known  as  the  Sertao,  has  powerfully  contributed, 
as  also  has  the  isolation  of  their  lives.  From  the 
earliest  colonial  times  the  crown  of  Portugal  neglected 
the  Sertao  because  its  only  industry  was  cattle-breeding, 
and  this  did  not  afford  in  those  days  a  good  field  for  taxa- 
tion, which  chiefly  fell  upon  the  gold  mines  of  Goyaz. 

This  circumstance,  although  in  some  respects  it 
probably  contributed  to  the  increase  of  cattle-breeding, 
still  further  shut  off  the  inhabitants  from  communion 
with  the  outer  world. 

"  To-day,"  as  Joao  Ribeira  says  in  his  "  History 
of  Brazil,"*!-  "  ^^e  Sertanejo  presents  a  type  finer  and 
purer  than  the  dweller  on  the  coast,  where  the  race  is 
so  much  mixed  with  the  negro  blood. 

"The  Sertanejos  are  dark-skinned  indeed,  but  their 
hair  is  often  fair.  .  .  .  Being  accustomed  from  their 
earliest  youth  to  the  use  of  arms,  they  are  apt  to  fly 
to  them  unduly  to  revenge  even  the  smallest  slight. 
.  .  .  They  are  suspicious  of  all  outside  influence,  and 
refractory  to  modern  life." 

*  Plural  of  Sertao. 

t  Joao  Ribeira,  "  Historio  do  Brazil,"  Rio  de  Janeiro,  1909. 


14  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

In  point   of  fact   it   took  eighty   to  one  hundred 
years  to  open  up  the  Sertao  properly.     Only  in  171 5, 
and  after  the  Treaty  of  Madrid  was  signed  between 
Spain    and    Portugal,    was    the    whole    country    free 
for  cattle  men  to  settle  in  and  to  possess.     At  first 
they  settled  timidly  upon  the  foothills,  then  gradually 
passed  them  and  spread  to  the  interior  ;  but  the  chief 
road  of  Brazilian  exploration  and  of  settlement  was 
by  the  River  San  Francisco,  the  only  riverof  consider- 
able size  upon  that  region  of  the  coast.     They  advanced 
along  it,  settling  both  sides,  and  by  degrees  came  to 
the  falls  of  Paulo  Affonso,  which  checked  their  pro- 
gress, making  them  spread  out  towards  the  interior. 
These  falls,  whose  very  name  is  generally  unknown  to 
those  who  have  not  visited  Brazil,  are  a  worthy  rival 
of  Niagara.     Their  height  is  somewhere  about  two 
hundred  and  fifty  feet,  their  volume  little  inferior  to 
Niagara,  but  their  surroundings,  and  the  fact  that  just 
below   the   falls   the    river  is   narrowed   to   a  chasm 
between    two   lofty  rocks,  makes    them    superior    in 
interest  to  the  more  famous  falls.     The  tropic  vege- 
tation, with    the    groves  of  palms   and  of  bamboos 
fringing  the  bank,  the  brightly  coloured   birds,  the 
solitude,  the  perpetual  rainbow  that  hangs  upon  the 
columns  of  white  spray  resembling  a  fog-bow  seen  at 
sea,    and    the    deep    channels  just    below    the   rocks 
cut  into  rapids  and  a   thousand  cataracts,  make  the 
Brazilian  waterfall    one   of  the  finest  in  the  world. 
Thus,  in   the  Sertao   all  has   contributed    to  a   type 
of  man  and  to  a  scheme   of  life  perhaps  unique  in 
a  world  where  all  types  tend  to  disappear.     In  fact, 
in  all  Brazil  the  Sertao  alone  has  the   traditions   of 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  15 

a  national  life,  and  it  is  there  that  one  must  look 
for  the  Brazilian  with  all  his  virtues  and  his  vices  most 
accentuated. 

Lying  as  the  district  does  v^ithin  the  tropics,  in 
latitude  13°  below  the  line,  the  rains  should  be 
abundant  and  the  climate  tropical, "^  as  they  are  upon 
the  coast.  It  is  far  different  in  the  Sertao.  As  the  road 
nears  the  mountains,  little  by  little  both  soil  and  vege- 
tation change.  The  black,  rich  earth  of  the  low 
alluvial  plains  melts  by  degrees  and  loses  colour,  until 
a  region  of  a  red,  friable,  sandy  soil  appears.  That 
is  the  characteristic  colour  of  the  soil  of  the  Sertao, 
and  also  of  great  tracts  of  country  in  the  interior 
of  Brazil.  The  giants  of  the  primeval  forest,  with 
their  dark,  metallic  leaves  all  twisted  round  with 
rope-like  creeping  plants,  whose  branches  of  bright 
scarlet  or  vivid  yellow  blossoms  hang  in  festoons, 
or,  reaching  up  above  the  stem,  appear  to  be  the 
flowers  of  the  tree  to  which  they  cling,  disappear 
by  degrees.  Their  place  is  taken  by  the  cactuses 
and  the  Bromeliaceas,  especially  the  variety  called  in 
Brazil  Caraguata,  and  in  Jamaica  the  wild  pineapple. 
Ceibas  and  Jacarandas,  Sapucayas,  Jequitibas,  Moca- 
hybas,  and  all  the  myriad  trees  that  flower  and  die 
unknown  in  the  great  forests  of  the  coast,  all  disappear. 
The  scrubby,  thorny  palm  of  the  Sertao,  called  Yatai 
in  Paraguay,  the  Mangabeira,  with  its  whitish-yellow 
flowers  that  look  like  jasmine,  and  the  Imbuzeiro, 
whose  leaves  resist  the  devouring  droughts  of  summer 

*  As  in  most  tropical  countries,  there  are  only  two  seasons,  the 
wet  and  dry.  In  the  Sertao  they  are  known  as  "  Verde  e  Magrem  '* 
— literally,  the  "  green  and  fasting." 


i6  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

and  furnish  fodder  for  the  cattle,  and  a  dish  known 
to  the  Sertanejos  as  "  imbuzada,"  made  from  a  paste 
procured  by  pounding  up  the  nuts,  alone  endure  the 
climate  and  the  scant,  sandy  soil. 

These  and  a  thorny  scrub  are  the  chief  vegetation 
of  the  "  caatingas  "  as  they  are  called,  those  little  open 
plains  bounded  by  thick,  almost  impenetrable  bush, 
which  tears  all  clothing  but  the  deerskin  that  the 
Vaqueiros*  wear.  Lichens  and  moss  all  disappear  in 
the  dry,  arid  climate,  whilst  here  and  there  under 
a  palm-tree  are  seen  those  water  holes  known  as 
*'  cacimbas,"  which  the  inhabitants,  who  wage  a  con- 
stant war  with  thirst  at  certain  seasons  of  the  year,  dig 
where  a  trace  of  vegetation  shows  there  is  water 
underneath  the  ground.  Little  by  little  the  landscape 
grows  impassive,  almost  menacing,  naked,  inhospitable, 
and  monotonous.  It  is  a  land  of  thirst,  of  great 
ex'-remes  of  temperature,  of  sudden  storms,  of  frozen 
nights  succeeding  days  of  the  intensest  heat ;  a  land 
where  man  has  got  to  fight  for  his  existence  against 
drought,  storms,  heat,  cold,  hunger,  and  thirst,  and 
thus  becomes  toughened  and  hardened,  bodily  and 
mentally  thrown  back  upon  himself,  fanatical  in 
his  religion,  introspective,  visionary,  brave,  hospitable, 
suspicious,  cruel  and  generous,  made  up  of  contradic- 
tions, fitted  to  struggle  with  the  daily  trials  of  his  life. 
In  the  blazing  heat  and  scorching  cold  the  very 
plants  get  stunted  ;  the  leguminoss  that  generally 
grow  so  tall  within  the  tropics,  here  are  dwarfed. 
Amongst  that  family,  the  plants  called  "  as  favellas " 
by  the  Sertanejos,  unclassified  as  far  as  at  present 
*  Vaqueiro  =  cattle-herder. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  17 

known  in  any  catalogue  of  plants,  has  the  strange 
property  that  one  side  of  its  leaf  retains  the  coldness 
of  the  night  air,  at  the  same  time  the  other  keeps  the 
noonday  temperature.  Other  plants,  such  as  that 
known  as  "  as  patatas  do  Vaqueiro,"*  have  roots  that 
penetrate  yards  under  the  surface  of  the  ground.  It 
also  furnishes  a  tuber  not  unlike  the  potato,  which 
in  the  droughts  often  is  the  sole  food  of  the 
inhabitants. 

This  struggle  for  existence  amongst  plants  and 
trees  presents  its  counterpart  amongst  mankind.  The 
climate  sees  to  it  that  only  those  most  fitted  to  resist 
it  arrive  at  manhood,  and  the  rude  life  they  subse- 
quently lead  has  forged  a  race  as  hard  as  the  Castilians, 
the  Turk,  the  Scythians  of  old,  or  as  the  Mexicans. 

No  race  in  all  America  is  better  fitted  to  cope  with 
the  wilderness.  The  Sertanejo  is  emphatically  what 
the  French  call  "  a  male."  His  Indian  blood  has  given 
him  endurance  and  a  superhuman  patience  in  adversity. 
From  his  white  forefathers  he  has  derived  intelligence, 
the  love  of  individual  as  opposed  to  general  freedom 
inherent  in  the  Latin  races,  good  manners,  and  a 
sound  dose  of  self-respect.  His  tinge  of  negro  blood, 
although  in  the  Sertao  it  tends  to  disappear  out  of  the 
race,  at  least  in  outward  characteristics,  may  perchance 
have  given  him  whatever  qualities  the  African  can 
claim.  Far  from  demonstrative,  he  yet  feels  deeply  ; 
never  forgets  a  benefit,  and  cherishes  an  insult  as  if  it 
were  a  pearl  of  price,  safe  to  revenge  it  when  the 
season  offers  or  when  the  enemy  is  off  his  guard. 

*  The    plant    is    described,    but    not    classified,    in    Henderson's 
"  Brazil."     It  is  probably  of  the  Convolvulus  family. 


1 8  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Centaurs  before  the  Lord,  the  Sertanejos  do  not 
appear  (almost  alone  of  horsemen)  to  have  that  pride 
in  their  appearance  so  noticeable  in  the  Gaucho,  the 
Mexican,  and  in  the  Arabs  of  North  Africa.  Seated 
in  his  short  curved  saddle,  a  modification  of  the 
"  recao  "  used  on  the  Pampas  of  the  Argentine,  the 
Sertanejo  lounges,  sticks  his  feet  forw^ard,  and  rides, 
as  goes  the  saying,  all  about  his  horse,  using, 
of  course,  a  single  rein,  and  the  high  hand  all 
natural  horsemen  affect.*  Yet,  when  a  bunch  of 
cattle  break  into  a  wild  stampede,  the  man  is  suddenly 
transformed.  Then  he  sits  upright  as  a  lance,  or, 
bending  low  over  his  horse's  neck,  flies  at  a  break-neck 
pace,  dashing  through  the  thick  scrub  of  the  Caatingas 
in  a  way  that  must  be  seen  to  be  believed.  Menacing 
boughs  hang  low  and  threaten  him.  He  throws 
himself  flat  on  the  horse's  back,  and  passes  under 
them.  A  tree  stands  in  his  way  right  in  the  middle 
of  his  headlong  career.  If  his  horse,  highly  trained 
and  bitted,  fails  to  stop  in  time,  he  slips  off  like  a  drop 
of  water  from  a  pane  of  glass  at  the  last  moment,  or  if 
there  is  the  smallest  chance  of  passing  on  one  side, 
lies  low  along  his  horse's  flank  after  the  fashion  of  an 
old-time  Apache  or  Comanche  on  the  war-path. 

The  frightened  cattle  rush  through  the  Caatinga 
with  the  speed  of  thought.  The  thick  scrub  opens 
at  their  passage,  and  hides  them  utterly.  The 
Sertanejo  follows,  and  he  too  passes  and  is  swallowed 
up,  leaving  no  trace  of  where  he  has  passed  through. 

*  The  bit  used  all  over  Brazil  is  a  modification  of  the  bit  brought 
by  the  conquerors,  and  is  not  unlike  that  of  the  horse  in  King 
Charles's  statue  in  Trafalgar  Square. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  19 

"  Where  the  steer*  passes,  there  the  Vaqueiro  with  his 
horse  can  pass,"  is  a  proverbial  saying  in  the  Sertao, 
and  it  is  certainly  a  fact.  If  the  bunch  of  cattle  that 
he  is  pursuing  should  be  sufficiently  incautious  to 
leave  the  shelter  of  the  woods  and  enter  one  of  the 
little  plains  that  stretch  like  lakes  or  like  oases  in  the 
middle  of  the  woods,  the  Vaqueiro,  brandishing  his 
long  and  iron-tipped  goad,  called  a  "  guiada,"  is  on 
their  flanks  within  the  twinkling  of  an  eye,  and  turns 
them  back  into  the  road  for  home.  As  a  general  rule, 
unless  frightened  by  fire  or  when  they  run  before  a 
storm,  cattle — that  is,  semi-domesticated  cattle — settle 
down  when  they  are  turned.  It  takes  a  good  horse 
and  a  bold  rider  to  come  up  with  a  bunch  of 
frightened  cattle  upon  any  ground ;  but  then  no 
horseman  in  the  world  can  hold  his  own  with  the 
Vaqueiro  of  the  Sertao  dressed  in  his  panoply-f-  of 
leather  and  on  the  ground  he  knows. 

*  "  Por  onde  passa  o  boi,  passa  o  vaqueiro  com  o  seu  caballo." 
t  I  use  the  word  "  panoply  "  advisedly,  for  the  effect  of  the  stiff 
leather  clothes  is  very  like  that  of  armour.  The  outfit  consists  of ;  The 
hat  (chapeio)  ;  this  is  low,  very  stiff-brimmed,  and  not  much  unlike 
the  steel  hat  our  troops  use  in  France  ;  it  is  kept  in  place  by  a  leather 
chin-strap.     The  leather   gauntlets  ("as   luvas").     The  skin-tight 
trousers  ("  as  perneras  ")  ;  they  have  to  be  tight-fitting,  for  any  fold 
would   catch    the    thorns   and    tear    in    their    wild    gallops  through 
the  bush.     The  jacket,   called  "  o  gibao,"  which  literally  means  a 
doublet.    The  knee-caps  ("  as  joelheiras  "),  to  protect  the  knees  from 
thorns,    and    stiff    gaiters,    known    as   "  guarda-pes,"    complete    the 
accoutrement.     The  horse,  too,  has  his  armour,  without  which  he 
would  be  torn  to  pieces  in  the  thorns.     Over  his  quarters  falls  a 
covering  of  hide  which  reaches  almost  to   his  hocks.     His   "joel- 
heiras" protect  his  knees  as    they  do  those   of  the  Vaqueiro  who 
directs  him.     Lastly,  "  o  peitoral "  covers  his  shoulders  and  protects 
the  chest.     The  horse  is  seldom  shod,  but  does  not  seem  to  feel  the 
want  of  shoes  even  amongst  the  stones.     The  horses  of  the  SertSo 
are  small,  never  exceeding  fourteen  hands.     They  all  are  trained  to 


20  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

When  once  the  Vaqueiro  sees  the  cattle  begin  to 
settle  down  and  "  string  out,"  as  it  is  called,  in  a  long 
file,  or  stand  and  gaze  and  then  begin  to  eat,  he  raises 
the  curious  chant  called  O  Aboio — that  is  the  Cattle 
Song.  Sometimes  it  is  sounded  with  a  horn  ;  but  on 
occasions  such  as  this  the  Boiaro*  begins  to  sing  in  a 
low,  melancholy  voice.  The  effect  is  soothing  on  the 
cattle,  and  the  drawn-out  syllables — 

"  E  cou  mansao 
E  cou  e  cao  " — 

have  a  strange  effect  as  they  go  echoing  through  the 
woods.  All  this  occurs  if  the  stampeded  cattle  keep 
together  and  are  able  to  be  turned.  If,  on  the  other 
hand,  a  beast  or  two  cut  from  the  herd  and  take  their 
course  alone,  the  Vaqueiro,  who  cannot  use  the  lazo  on 
account  of  the  thick  scrub,  resorts  to  the  "  saiada," 
which  generally  succeeds  in  taming  even  the  wildest 
beast. 

Keeping  his  horse  in  hand  and  watching  well  his 
opportunity,  the  Vaqueiro,  when  he  sees  an  open 
place,  loosens  his  head  and  spurs  him.  In  a  bound  or 
two  he  puts  himself  close  alongside  the  steer.  Then, 
bending  in  the  saddle,  he  takes  a  firm  hold  of  the 
bullock's  tail,  and  turns  his  horse  a  little  outwards, 
and  with  a  powerful  twist  and  jerk,  he  throws  the 
animal  upon  its  side.-f*     The  shock  is  violent,  and  the 

amble,  and  are  descended  from  the  horses  brought  by  the  conquerors, 
without  any  admixture  of  blood,  since  the  conquest. 

*  There  is  no  word  I  know  in  English  to  express  Boiaro.  There 
may  have  been  one  in  Sussex,  where  oxen  were  used  for  ploughing 
and  in  carts.     The  French  "  bouvier  "  is  an  exact  translation. 

t  Sometimes  this  feat  is  performed  with  the  goad,  which  is  pressed 
on  the  animal's  thigh  as  the  hind  feet  leave  the  ground. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  21 

feat  not  easy  to  perform.  Quicker  than  thought, 
before  the  animal  can  rise,  the  Vaqueiro  springs  from 
his  horse,  ahghting  Hke  a  cat  upon  his  feet.  His 
horse  stands  still,  trained  to  avoid  the  long  hide  reins 
which  the  Vaqueiro  throws  upon  the  ground.  Then, 
rushing  to  the  prostrate  animal,  he  drags  its  forefoot 
over  the  near  horn  and  leaves  it  helpless  on  the  ground. 
His  horse  awaits  him  like  a  statue,  and  he,  bounding 
upon  its  back,  is  off  again  after  another  animal.  The 
whole  thing  passes  in  a  flash,  and  in  an  instant  the 
scrub  has  closed  upon  the  horseman,  leaving  the 
bullock  till  he  comes  back  again  to  take  its  foot  down 
from  its  horn. 

This  operation  is  a  dangerous  one,  for  by  this  time 
the  animal  has  got  its  wind  again,  and  not  unlikely 
charges  the  instant  that  it  feels  that  it  is  free.  Then 
comes  the  use  of  the  long  open  reins,  which  generally 
are  seven  feet  in  length.  Holding  them  by  their 
extremities,  the  Vaqueiro  carefully  goes  up  to  the 
fallen  animal,  taking  good  care  to  keep  a  tight  hand  on 
his  reins. 

Sometimes  the  shock  has  taken  all  the  fight  out 
of  the  bullock,  who  rises  sullenly  and  then  begins 
to  eat.  In  that  case  he  gives  no  more  trouble, 
and  can  be  driven  peaceably  towards  the  bunch  of 
cattle  which  by  that  time  is  being  kept  together  by 
several  horsemen.  At  other  times  he  charges  savagely. 
Then  the  Vaqueiro  either  mounts  as  quickly  as  he  can 
and  gallops  off,  or,  diving  underneath  his  horse,  mounts 
on  the  offside,  leaving  the  bullock  looking  for  him  in 
amazement.  This  sort  of  life,  sustained  upon  a  diet 
of  dried    beef,   called   by    the    Vaqueiros    Carne    do 


22  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

vento*  (that  is,  wind-dried  meat),  and  Angu,  a  sort  of 
porridge  made  of  maize  or  from  a  paste  of  the  nuts 
of  the  palm  called  Coco  Naia,  makes  a  race  of  men 
not  to  be  daunted  even  by  the  climate  of  the  Sertao. 

On  foot  they  walk  like  sailors  just  come  ashore 
after  a  whaling  cruise,  rolling  about  upon  their  legs, 
bandied  by  early  riding,  as  do  the  cow-punchers  of 
Western  America,  and  as  the  Medes  were  said  to  walk 
by  the  Greek  historians. 

Nevertheless,  they  go  out  with  a  forked  stick  and 
a  long  knife  on  foot  to  kill  the  jaguar,"!*  called  by  them 
Su9uarana,  which  must  be  a  Tupi  or  some  other 
Indian  word.  The  method  they  adopt  is  simple,  for 
having  tracked  the  jaguar,  they  rouse  him  from  his 
lair  with  dogs,  and  when  he  charges,  as  he  generally 
does  when  he  finds  himself  at  bay,  the  man  who 
carries  the  forked  stick  drops  on  one  knee  and  catches 
the  beast  with  it  as  he  springs.  His  companion,  who 
either  has  a  long,  sharp  knife  or  a  short,  heavy  spear, 
loses  no  time  in  burying  it  in  the  jaguar's  belly  or  his 
throat.     This  sport,  which  must  be  quite  as  exciting 

*  Carne  do  vento  is  the  Charqui  of  the  Argentines,  the  Tasajo  of 
the  Mexicans,  or  the  Biltong  of  the  Boers.  It  is  made  by  cutting 
beef  into  long  thin  strips  and  exposing  it  to  the  sun  for  about  three 
days.  It  can  be  dipped  in  orange,  lemon,  or  other  juices  to  give 
it  a  flavour.  Few^  European  teeth  stand  it  long.  Pounded  and 
mixed  with  a  little  cinnamon  it  is  life-sustaining  on  a  journey,  but 
scarcely  palatable.  The  Sertanejos  do  not  use  it  in  this  manner  as 
far  as  I  know,  but  they  do  use  a  curious  confection  known  as  "  esteira 
de  Imbu,"  which  is  the  juice  of  the  Imbuzeiro  run  into  a  mould  and 
hardened.  It  is  then  rolled  into  thin  cylinders  like  wafers.  It  keeps 
a  long  time,  is  very  handy  for  a  journey,  and  very  sustaining. 

t  Jaguar  means  dog  in  Guarani,  and  a  tiger  is  called  Jaguj(ret6 — 
that  is,  the  big  dog  ;  for  the  Guaranis  did  not  know  the  cat  till  after 
the  conquest.  The  first  cats  taken  to  Asuncion  sold  for  a  pound  of 
gold.     When  I  knew  the  place  the  price  had  fallen. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  23 

as  shooting  pigeons  from  a  trap,  is  often  fatal  to  the 
sportsmen  if  anything  goes  wrong.  In  Brazil,  in 
Mexico  and  Venezuela,  many  large  cattle  farms  have  a 
man  called  a  tigrero,  for  the  jaguar  is  generally  called 
el  tigre  (the  tiger)  in  the  Spanish  Republics,  whose 
office  is  to  kill  the  tigers  who  prey  upon  the  stock. 

The  fight  with  the  droughts,  which  are  the  curse  of 
the  Sertao,  and  the  isolated  life  probably  account  for 
the  intensity  of  the  religious  faith  of  the  inhabitants. 
Abandoned  as  they  have  been  for  the  last  three 
hundred  years,  with  scarcely  any  intercourse  with  any- 
body from  the  outside  world,  Catholicism  with  them 
has  taken  on  many  of  the  characteristics  of  the  hardest 
Presbyterianism.  Sermons  are  filled  with  hell  and 
with  its  flames.  The  pains  and  penalties  that  await 
the  sinner,  the  tortures  of  the  damned,  are  all  set  forth 
with  just  as  faithful  ministration  as  used  to  be  the 
fashion  of  the  Cameronians  of  old. 

Their  religion  neither  consoles  nor  softens.  A 
fitting  faith  for  a  hard  land,  it  has  produced  a  people 
hard  as  itself  Faithful  indeed  to  the  shedding  of 
blood,  their  own  or  that  of  others,  they  look  up  to  their 
priests,  or  to  the  various  religious  leaders  who  have 
from  time  to  time  arisen  amongst  them,  as  something 
superhuman  and  in   direct  communication   with   the 

Deity. 

Nature  and  circumstances  seem  to  have  worked 
together  to  prepare  the  inhabitants  of  the  Sertao  for 
the  great  adventure  into  which  they  plunged  in  1896. 

The  history  of  the  numberless  religious  communities 
in  Brazil— for  they  can  hardly  be  termed  "sects,"  never 
having    left   the    Church    in    which  they  took  their 


24  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

origin — is  highly  curious,  and  hitherto  has  not  been 
dealt  with  adequately.  Yet  they  have  been  con- 
tinuous, and  now  and  then  fraught  with  considerable 
danger  to  the  State.  It  affords  field  for  speculation 
why  the  Portuguese,  so  much  less  fanatical  upon  the 
whole  than  were  the  Spaniards  in  the  New  World, 
should  have  exhibited  such  strange  religious  movements 
in  Brazil,  and  more  especially  in  the  State  of  Bahia, 
almost  the  first  of  the  territories  to  be  colonised. 

The  reason  may  be  found  perhaps  in  the  clash  of 
temperaments  involved  in  the  excessive  crossing  of  the 
various  types.  The  Portuguese,  a  race  of  Latin 
stock,  mixed  in  the  north  with  Celtic  and  in  the 
south  with  Arab  and  with  Berber  blood,  had,  at  the 
time  the  conquest  of  Brazil  was  carried  out,  become 
infected,  in  Lisbon  and  the  surrounding  district,  with 
a  strain  of  negro  blood.  It  was  estimated  that  there 
were  at  least  ten  thousand  negroes  in  the  capital, 
the  result  of  the  Portuguese  conquests  on  the  Guinea 
coasts. 

Garcia  de  Rezende,  a  writer  of  those  days  (1530), 
says  in  verse,  of  which  the  following  is  the  free 
rendering  :  '*  We  see  the  number  of  slaves  put  into 
the  kingdom  increase  so  much  that  the  natives  will 
have  to  go.  Thus,  soon,  they  [the  captives]  will 
number  more  than  us,  as  I  see  the  question."* 

Thus  the  Portuguese  at  that  time,  or  at  least  those 
coming  from  Lisbon  and  the  south,  with  the  probable 

*  "  Vemos  no  reyno  metter 
Tantos  captivos  crescer 
Irense  os  naturaes 
Que  se  assim  for  serao  mais 
Elles  que  nos,  a  meu  ver." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  25 

tinge  of  negro  blood  they  had  in  them,  must  also 
certainly  have  had  a  disposition,  or  predisposition,  to 
the  animism  so  characteristic  of  the  negro  race. 
Those  who  have  known  the  negro  on  the  coast  of 
Africa  have  all  remarked  the  enormous  place  religion 
— for  it  is  just  as  hard  to  set  the  bounds  between  religion 
and  superstition  as  those  of  instinct  and  of  reason,  and 
to  say  where  the  one  finishes  and  the  next  begins — 
holds  in  his  mind  and  life. 

His  world  is  full  of  spirits — of  the  streams,  the  trees, 
the  dead.  The  living  can  dissociate  their  bodies  from 
their  souls  to  plague  the  negro.  He  lives  surrounded 
by  a  world  he  cannot  see,  but  feels  in  every  action  of 
his  life.  Hence  his  belief  in  gri-gris,  fetishes,^  the 
multiplicity  of  Ju-ju  houses,  his  human  sacrifices, 
witch  doctors,  and  in  some  instances  his  cannibalism. 
No  race  of  men  has  ever  been  a  fairer  field  for 
missionary  work.  Theirs  is  a  mind  prepared  to 
listen  to  anyone  who  has  a  theory  of  the  universe ;  to 
listen  and  accept,  and  place  the  gods — for  naturally 
the  negro  looked  upon  the  Trinity  as  three  new  beings 
sent  to  him  to  adore — in  his  Pantheon. 

No  race  of  men  ever,  when  once  converted,  sang 
their  hymns  with  greater  fervour.  The  Methodist, 
Wesleyan,  Presbyterian,  and  generally  all  sects  that 
place  faith  over  works,  appealed  to  his  imagination, 
and  marked  him  as  their  own.  Curiously  enough,  the 
Roman  Catholics,  though  so  successful  with  the 
Indians  of  America,  some  of  the  races  of  the  East,  and 
the  Chinese,  seem  to  have  made  but  small  appeal  to 
any  of  the  races  on  the  coast  of  Africa.      The  Mass, 

*  From  the  Portuguese  "  feiti^o." 


26  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

so  awe-inspiring  to  the  Indians,  says  little  to  the  negro 
(of  the  Coast);  but,  on  the  contrary,  seems  to  dissever 
him  from  all  participation  in  the  worship  he  attends. 
He  likes  to  sing,  to  pray,  and  to  perspire  with  fervour, 
and  feel  himself,  as  it  were,  in  direct  communication 
with  his  God.  Faith,  with  the  negro,  is  the  sheet 
anchor,  and  what  is  the  use,  if  the  sheet  anchor  holds, 
of  putting  out  a  smaller  holdfast  anywhere  ?  .  Hence 
his  neglect  of  works.  That  such  is  pretty  nearly 
absolute,  all  those  who  know  Jamaica,  the  Southern 
States  of  North  America,  or  any  other  place  where 
negroes  have  adopted  any  of  the  more  animistic  of  the 
creeds  of  Protestantism,  can  testify. 

Faith,  to  the  negro  nature,  is  a  necessity  of  lite. 
Good  works  do  not  appear  to  enter  into  his  mental 
composition,  and  hence  perhaps  the  curious  likeness 
that  is  to  be  observed  between  so  many  of  the  religious 
movements  that  have  arisen  in  Brazil  and  those  of 
Asia  Minor  in  the  first  and  second  centuries. 

The  Indian  of  Brazil  has,  with  slight  differences, 
the  characteristics  to  be  observed  in  all  the  Indians  of 
America,  outside  the  redskin  tribes.  We  can  but 
iudge  what  kind  of  men  the  Tupis  were  by  the 
crossbreeds  that  they  have  left,  and  by  the  Indians 
who  to-day  exist  in  various  quarters  of  Brazil  under 
conditions  similar  to  theirs  at  the  first  conquest  of  the 
land.  Still,  it  is  to  be  observed,  in  judging  men  of 
savage  races,  who  for  three  hundred  years  or  more,  as 
in  Brazil,  have  lived  under  the  knowledge  and  the 
menace  of  the  whites,  and  usually  have  come  in 
contact  only  with  the  scum  of  the  white  population 
on  the  frontiers,  or  with  the  soldiers  sent  against  them 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  27 

in  military  expeditions,  that  they  are  certainly  inferior 
to  what  they  were  three  hundred  years  ago.  Generally 
their  chiefs  and  men  of  superior  caste  have  been  killed 
off,  their  daughters  in  the  days  of  the  first  conquest 
often  marrying  whites,  as  in  the  case  of  Paraguassu, 
and  the  Inca  princess  who  married  Garcilaso  de  la 
Vega,  and  many  other  instances. 

Often  the  wilder  tribes  exist  in  almost  the  same 
state  as  that  in  which  the  first  historians  of  the  Indies 
wrote  of  them,  but  having  dropped  the  industries, 
which  they  were  slowly  struggling  to  a  knowledge  of, 
and  gone  back  absolutely  to  a  savage  state.  This  is 
especially  to  be  noted  in  the  case  of  a  tribe  known  as 
the  Pimentereios,  who  in  the  year  1760  suddenly  made 
their  appearance  in  the  State  of  Piauhy.*  No  one 
knew  where  they  came  from ;  for  fifty  years  no 
Indians  had  been  known  in  a  wild  state  throughout 
the  territory.  The  Pimentereios  soon  made  their 
presence  felt  by  slaughtering  cattle,  burning  isolated 
houses,  and  killing  everyone  they  came  across.  They 
kept  the  territory  in  alarm  for  years,  till  a  Paulista,-^- 
one  Domingos  Jorge,  exterminated  many  of  them  and 
forced  the  others  to  retire.  It  was  conjectured  that 
these  Indians  were  the  descendants  of  a  domesticated 

*  This  State  borders  upon  Pernambuco  on  the  south  and  Maranhao 
on  the  north. 

t  The  Paulistas  were  the  inhabitants  of  Sao  Paulo,  a  southern 
State.  Most  of  them  at  the  time  of  Domingos  Jorge  had  Indian 
blood.  Yet,  under  the  name  of  Mamalucos,  the  Indians  of  the  Jesuit 
Reductions  in  Paraguay  never  had  enemies  so  bitter  or  so  cruel.  The 
forays  of  the  Paulistas  in  search  of  slaves  forced  the  Jesuits  to  make 
their  celebrated  retreat  with  all  their  neophytes,  a  retreat  which 
Father  Ruiz  Montoya  has  described  so  graphically  that  it  has  become 
almost  the  epic  of  the  Guaranis. 


28  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

tribe  living  near  a  place  called  Quebrobo,  and  that 
they  had  left  a  life  of  semi-civilisation  to  go  back  to 
the  woods,  having  refused  to  fight  against  their  wilder 
brethren,  when  called  upon  to  do  so  by  the  whites. 
Should,  therefore,  any  of  them  have  survived  to-day  in 
a  wild  state,  deep  in  the  equatorial  forests,  it  is  clear 
that  they  must  now  be  savager  and  less  civilised  than 
they  were  in  the  year  1760,  after  their  short  experience 
of  settled  life.     The  Indians  of  Brazil,  left  probably 
without    their    chiefs,   and    converted    more    or    less 
by  force,  found  in   the  Jesuits  their  best  protectors 
against  the  colonists,  who  looked  on  them  as  merely 
beasts  of  burden,  though,  luckily  for  the  Indians,  at 
that  time  there  were  no  mines  discovered  in  Brazil, 
as  there  had  been  in  nearly  all  the  Spanish  colonies. 
The    Jesuits    probably    treated    them    somewhat    as 
neophytes  to  be  instructed  in  the  faith — somewhat  in 
the    fashion  of  indentured    labourers.     At    any  rate, 
their  yoke  was  preferable  to  that  of  the  Paulistas  or  of 
the  sugar-planters.     The  Jesuit  system  was  to  assemble 
as    many    Indians    as    they    could    in    villages.       In 
Paraguay,  at  least,  where  they  had  to  deal  with  the 
gentle  Guaranis,  their  rule,  was  light,  and  now  and 
then    they    winked   at    the    Indians    retaining    pagan 
ceremonies,  so  that  they  had  not  anything  cruel  in 
them.     In  Brazil  the  Tupis  were  a  harder  race,  and 
the  settlements  the  Jesuits  made  never  attained  the 
great  proportions  of  their  Reductions  in   Paraguay,* 
although  from  the  first  conquests  they  laboured  in  the 
same  way  as  they  did  in  the  former  country. 

*  "  E  OS  ajuntaram  em  grandes  alldeias." — "  Annaes  da  Biblioteca 
Nacional,"  Rio  de  Janeiro,  1906. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  29 

Vicente  Monteiro  in  his  report  to  Mem  de  Sa,  the 
Governor,  talks  of  the  Jesuits  having  been  advised  to 
gather  up  (the  Indians)  in  large  villages.  As  time 
went  on  and  interbreeding  both  v^ith  the  whites  and 
negroes  took  place,  the  Indians  in  the  villages 
gradually  became  absorbed  into  the  civil  population. 

Their  natural  character,  hard  and  suspicious,  fierce 
and  bloodthirsty,  had  not  the  time,  that  it  had  in 
Paraguay,  to  become  modified  under  the  Jesuit  rule. 
No  race  in  all  the  world  is  so  impenetrable  as  is  the 
Indian,  in  the  reserve  with  which  it  arms  itself  against 
the  ills  of  fortune,  fights  against  tyranny  or  resists 
oppression,  so  to  speak  by  enduring  it  without 
complaint.  Such  a  race  of  men,  reserved,  suspicious, 
hospitable,  vindictive,  brave,  cruel  and  hardy,  taciturn 
in  speech,  and  patient  almost  beyond  the  bounds  of 
human  patience,  was  almost  certain  to  become  imbued 
with  strong  religious  faith.  They  had  not,  as  had 
the  negroes,  a  well-inhabited  Pantheon,  to  which  to 
add  another  deity  or  two  was  but  a  simple  thing,  for 
room  was  ample  and  the  newcomer  had  full  elbow- 
room.  Their  atmosphere,  then-  trees,  their  rivers  and 
their  world  in  general  contained  no  wealth  of  spirits. 
They  had  no  Ju-ju  houses,  and  their  fetishes  were 
few,  feeble,  and  far  between.  Their  cast  of  mind 
was  the  least  animistic,  with  the  exception,  possibly,  of 
that  of  the  Arabs,  of  any  of  the  races  of  mankind. 
Their  forms  of  worship  were  extremely  simple,  their 
dogmas  simpler,  consisting  often  of  little  more  than 
some  vague  belief  in  a  great  spirit  or  of  sun-worship. 
They  used  no  human  sacrifice  in  their  religion* — at 
*  Cannibalism,  though,  was  widely  diffused  amongst  them. 


30  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

least,  the  Indians  of  Brazil  are  not  known  ever  to  have 
done  so — and  generally  their  ritual  consisted  in  pour- 
ing out  a  calabash  of  water  to  the  sun  at  daybreak,  if 
it  was  him  that  they  adored.  None  of  them  had 
idols,  nor  do  the  Jesuits  or  the  Franciscans,  or  any  of 
the  missionaries  who  knew  them  at  the  conquest  or 
shortly  afterwards,  ever  make  mention  of  anything 
approaching  to  what  they  certainly  would  have  called 
graven  images.  Most  of  them  seem  to  have  believed 
in  a  spirit  of  evil,  to  be  propitiated  in  the  usual  way, 
by  offerings  of  fruit  and  flowers,  of  game,  and 
generally  of  anything  the  offerer  had  no  great  use  for, 
though  in  some  cases  he  would  offer  up  a  favourite 
bow,  or  blowpipe,  and  in  extremity  a  finger  from  his 
hand.  This  spirit,  who  really  had  so  much  more 
influence  on  their  lives  than  his  antagonist,  the  good 
spirit,  just  as  it  often  happens  with  ourselves,  was 
called  Anhanga.  Their  deity  they  named  Tupan, 
and  as  the  early  Jesuit  missionaries  say,  gave  almost 
equal  cult  to  the  twin  deities,  although  Tupan  they 
held  as  the  creator  of  the  world.  They  nearly  all 
believed  in  the  immortality  of  the  soul ;  but  that 
belief  seems  to  have  had  but  little  influence  on  their 
lives,  much  in  the  same  way  that  beliefs  in  general, 
however  strongly  held,  appear  to  spend  themselves  in 
the  mere  action  of  belief,  and  are  but  seldom  followed 
by  good  deeds.  The  Tupis  seem  to  have  come  to  a 
comprehension  of  the  true  faith — that  is  to  say,  the 
true  faith  as  the  Jesuits  conceived  it — not  without 
difficulty. 

Baptism  for   a  long    time  stuck  in   their   throats, 
although  to  us  it  seems  a  simple  enough  rite.     They 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  31 

thought  it  likely  to  bring  on  coughs  and  colds,  a  not 
unreasonable*  superstition,  if  the  immersion  plan  was 
general  amongst  the  missionaries.  Smallpox  was  also 
almost  certain  to  ensue  after  this  fateful  ceremony. 

Father  Lorenzana,  writing  of  the  Chaco  tribes,-]- 
mentions  a  similar  belief,  and  says  that  the  poor  Indian 
attacked  by  any  illness  imported  from  Europe  sought 
to  free  himself  from  the  effects  of  baptism  by  wash- 
ing his  head  with  sand,  and  scraping  his  tongue  with 
a  shell. 

Occasionally,  the  Tupis  after  conversion  altered  the 
Catholic  faith  to  what  to  them  seemed  natural,  and 
Southey  tells  that  a  Jesuit  complained  that  having 
delayed  his  visitation  for  two  years,  he  found  a  chief 
had  set  up  a  new  faith,  in  which  the  Blessed  Virgin 
had  become  God's  wife.  The  Jesuit  complains  that 
these  "  heretics  "  used  the  symbol  of  the  cross,  but 
without  veneration,  though  he  does  not  explain  the 
way  in  which  they  lacked  the  veneration  necessary. 

All  was  put  right  as  Southey  tells  us  tartly, 
by  the  chiefs  death,  "for  his  mythology  perished 
with  him."  In  fact,  when  the  mad  dog  is  dead 
the  rabies  also  dies,  as  goes  the  adage,  in  Castilian. 

Thus  the  conversion  of  the  Tupis  had  its  difficulties, 
and  even  then  in  their  Malocas  j  were  to  be  found  the 

*  Southey,  in  his  "  History  of  Brazil,"  quotes  this  singular  super- 
stition from  the  works  of  a  Jesuit. 

t  Lorenzana,  "  Gran  Chaco  de  Gualamba." 

X  Maloca  was  the  word  used  for  the  primitive  Indian  settlements. 
The  houses  were  generally  built  in  a  square,  round  a  central  plaza, 
and  communicated  with  one  another.  This  form  was  adopted  by  the 
Jesuits  in  Paraguay,  or  allowed  to  remain,  in  their  Reductions,  and  is 
to  be  seen  still  both  in  that  country  and  Brazil. 


32  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

germs    of  heresy,  destined    to    bear   its   fruit   in   the 
reHgious  history  of  Brazil, 

What  chiefly  differentiated  all  the  wild  Indians  of 
America  from  every  other  of  the  races  of  mankind 
was  their  attachment  to  their  individual  liberty.* 
Their  chiefs  seldom  had  great  authority,  and  usually 
were  chosen  but  for  the  duration  of  a  war,  and  even 
then  had  no  concern  with  anything  but  military 
things.  Few  of  them  were  polygamists,  and  in  the 
relationship  between  the  sexes -f*  were  singularly  strict, 
until  the  whites,  in  introducing  the  true  faith  amongst 
them,  failed  first  to  comprehend  that  faith  themselves 
and  then  by  their  example  broke  down  the  tribal 
habits  that  had  survived  from  the  remotest  ages  of 
mankind,  and  gave  the  Indians  no  fixed  rule  of 
conduct  that  they  themselves  observed.  This  was  a 
fact  the  better  of  the  conquerors  often  realised,  though 
usually  upon  their  death-beds,  as  was  the  case  with 
the  last  living  of  the  conquerors  of  Peru  who  had 
accompanied  Pizarro  from  the  first  setting  out  from 
Panama.  This  man,  by  name  Marcio  Serra  de 
Lejesama,  in  his  confession  just  before  his  death, 
addressed,  as  he  says,  to  our  Lord  King  Philip  II. 
(1589),  after  rehearsing,  as  it  were,  the  profession  of 
his  faith,  and  setting  forth  that  all  he  did  had  been  ill 

*  "Caboclo  he  so  paro  hoje"  is  a  saying  in  the  Sertao,  meaning 
that  one  cannot  count  upon  an  Indian  for  more  rhan  one  day,  and  that 
he  will  not  be  bound  by  his  own  employer  to  keep  on  working. 

In  his  well-known  "  Down  the  Orinoco  in  a  Canoe,"  Perez 
Triana  tells  of  an  Indian  before  whom  he  spread  red  baize  and 
hatchets,  gunpowder  and  knives — the  wealth  of  Potosi  to  an  Indian — 
to  tempt  him  to  engage  to  paddle  for  three  days.  All  was  in  vain,  and 
the  Indian  went  off  happy  in  his  liberty. 

t  Padre  Gumilla,  in  his  "  Orinoco  Ilustrado,"  insists  on  this  point. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  33 

done,  puts  on  record,  '*  that  when  we  dispossessed 
these  people  of  their  lands,  there  was  no  thief  in 
the  whole  territory,  nor  any  maid  or  woman  who  was 
living  an  ill  life."  This  done,  he  finished,  saying,  "  I 
pray  to  God  that  He  will  pardon  me,  for  I  am  the 
last  to  die  of  all  the  conquerors  and  the  discoverers  .  .  . 
and  I  now  do  what  I  can  to  relieve  my  conscience."'^ 

There  have  been  worse  death-beds  of  more  pious 
men  than  Lejesama  was,  and  it  is  to  be  hoped  his 
Lord  did  pardon  him — that  is,  if  even  He  had  power 
to  wipe  out  yesterday,  making  it  even  as  to-day. 
Some  few  there  were  who  did  not  need  to  pray  upon 
their  death-beds,  except  as  we  have  all  the  need  of  it. 
Such  were  the  good  Lorenzano  de  Aldana,  who  came 
with  Alvarado  to  Peru.  He,  in  his  will,  left  all  his 
property  to  his  Indians,  in  payment  of  their  tribute 
in  the  future  during  their  natural  lives.  He,  with 
Alvar  Nunez  Cabe^a  de  Vaca,  and  Vasco  Nunez  de 
Balboa,  with  a  few  more,  were  the  bright  spirits  who 
rose  superior  to  their  times,  by  their  humanity. 

The  witch-doctor,  although  an  institution  in  almost 
all  the  Indian  tribes,  played  a  part  far  inferior  to  that 
played  by  the  Gri-gri  man  amongst  the  negroes  on 
the  coast  of  Africa.  The  attitude  of  the  converted 
Indian  towards  religion  was  widely  different  from 
that  the  negro  always  has  assumed.  Silent  and  intro- 
spective   as    he    was,  the    Indian    naturally  took   his 

■^  This  Lejesama  was  the  man  who,  as  his  share  of  the  Inca's 
treasure,  was  adjudged  the  golden  sun  from  the  Temple  of  the  Sun  in 
Cuzeo.  He  staked  and  lost  it  at  a  game  of  cards.  Afterwards  he 
never  touched  a  card  during  his  eventful  life. 

Repentance  usually  seems  to  have  come  to  him  tardily,  as  it  does 
to  most  of  us. 


34  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

religion  very  seriously.  No  one  has  ever  heard  a 
band  of  Indians  singing  hymns,  and  nothing  of  the 
curious  fervour  of  the  negro  ever  attaches  to  him. 
Upon  the  other  hand,  the  "  credo  quia  impossibilis  " 
is  quite  in  his  vein,  and  his  priests  usually  find  him 
an  obedient  member  of  his  Church. 

The  junction  of  such  strangely  different  idiosyn- 
crasies, dominated  by  the  more  potent  strain  brought 
by  the  Portuguese,  produced  a  religious  caste  of  mind 
specially  suited  to  the  growth  of  a  rude  Gnosticism. 
Three  centuries  of  isolation  have  given  ample  time 
for  its  development.     The  Sertanejos   have  been  all 
that    time    cut    off  from   the   exterior  v^orld,  partly 
by  circumstances  and  partly  of  their  own  free  will. 
Brazil,  unlike  most  other  countries  of  America,  was 
not  first  settled  up  on  the  sea  coast  or  in  the  flat  country 
between    it    and    the    hills.     The    ports   were    built, 
and   sugar-planting   entered  into   in  the   States,  such 
as    Bahia,   that   lie    within   the    tropics.     Then    the 
peculiar   configuration   of   the  country,   the  spur  of 
enterprise — and  the   Portuguese  of   those   days  were 
born  explorers  and  discoverers — drew  in  the  first  place 
expeditions  to   search  for  gold  and  silver  across   the 
mountain    ranges    that   run    nearly  along    the  whole 
coast  of  Brazil  at  an  average  distance  of  about  twenty 
to  nearly  sixty  miles  ;  then  cattle-breeders  followed 
them.     None  of  the  mountains  in  Bahia  exceed  four 
thousand  feet  in  height.     The  passes  never  are  more 
than  eighteen  hundred  to  two  thousand  feet  above  the 
level  of  the  sea.     Once  past  them,  the  region  called 
the  Sertao  begins,  different  in  all  respects  from  the 
coastal  plains. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  35 

The  barrier  of  granitic  gneiss,  cut  here  and  there 
l>y  bands  of  sand  and  chalk,  and  dykes  of  eruptive 
basic  rock,  shut  off  the  unknown  interior  from  the 
first  settlers. 

The  Indians  of  the  coast  received  what  gold  they 
had  from  the  tribes  beyond  the  mountains.  Occasion- 
ally an  Indian  from  the  interior  coming  to  purchase 
salt,  or  drawn  perhaps  by  the  accounts  he  heard  of  the 
new  race  of  bearded  beings  who  rode  strange  animals 
that  belched  out  fire  and  smoke,*  would  come  and 
talk  of  the  cool  climate  and  the  open  plains  beyond 
the  hills.  The  people  on  the  coast,  sweltering  in  the 
tropic  heat,  shut  in  by  the  dense  wall  of  vegetation 
that  even  still  seems  to  throw  a  ring  fence  round  the 
belt  that  stretches  from  the  ocean  to  the  hills,  were 
naturally  anxious  to  see  the  unknown  country  for 
themselves. 

These  adventures  always  proceeded  on  one  plan. 
The  adventurers  formed  themselves  into  a  company, 
known  in  Brazilian  Portuguese  as  a  Bandeira. 
Those  who  formed  the  Bandeira  contributed  arms, 
money,  food,  and  horses,  according  'to  their  means  ; 
from  the  Bandeira  came  the  term  "  Bandeirante,"  so 
well  known  in  the  history  of  the  conquest  of  Brazil. 
The  leaders  bore  the  name  of  Certanistas,  and  some  of 
them  had  marvellous  adventures,  and  have  become 
half  legendary,  their  exploits,  curious  and  wild  enough, 
having  been  mellowed  and  expanded  under  the  micro- 

*  In  many  parts  of  America  the  Indians  thought  the  horse  and  his 
rider  were  one  flesh,  and  that  the  musket  shots  were  flames  breathed 
by  the  horse,  so  that  to  them,  literally,  his  neck  was  clothed  with 
thunder. 


36  LIFE  AND   MIRACLES  OF 

scope  of  time.  Nothing  is  commoner  than  to  hear  a 
Fazendeiro,*  either  in  Sao  Paulo  or  Bahia,  say  :  *'  My 
ancestor  was  a  Bandeirante."  It  gives  him,  as  it  were,  a 
halo,  just  as  with  us  to  be  descended  from  a  Norman 
baron  or  a  Highland  Chief  imparts  a  status  often  as 
difficult  of  proof. 

Still,  many  of  the  expeditions  of  the  Bandeirantes 
are  historical,  and  the  adventures  they  encountered 
and  the  privations  they  endured  are  truly  marvellous, 
especially  of  those  who  penetrated  the  mountain 
barrier  in  the  first  settlement  of  Sao  Paulo,  and  of  the 
distant  Matto  Grosso,  whose  fastnesses  are  little 
known,  even  at  the  present  day. 

Most  of  these  Bandeirantes  were  Paulistas — that  is, 
inhabitants  of  Sao  Paulo — an  adventurous  race,  who 
from  the  first  have  set  their  seal  upon  Brazil. 

As  far  back  as  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  century 
a  Bandeirante,  one  Aleixo  Garcia,  with  his  brother 
and  a  small  expedition,  crossed  the  continent,  and 
passing  through  what  is  now  Paraguay,  reached  to 
the  foothills  of  the  -Andes,  a  journey  that  seems 
hardly  possible,  given  the  difficulties  he  had  to  meet 
with,  the  absolutely  unknown  country  that  he  had  to 
cross,  the  enormous  distance,  and  the  tribes  of  savage 
Indians  through  whose  territories  he  was  obliged  to 
pass  One  almost  fancies  that,  like  Fray  Marcos  de 
Niza,  the  bold  friar  who  set  out  from  Southern 
California  and  reached  the  Pueblos  on  the  Rio 
Grande,  visiting  Zuiii  and  describing  it  with  the  strange 
customs  of  the  Indians,  he  must  *'  have  followed  where 

*  Fazendeiro  is  a  man  who  has  a  fazenda — that  is,  an  estate;  thus 
f;izendeiro  equals  landowner. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  37 

the  Holy  Ghost  did  lead."  Few  expeditions  in  the 
history  of  the  opening  up  of  a  new  territory  have 
undergone  more  hardships  than  the  brief  records  of 
the  Bandeiras  have  preserved  for  us.  The  first  Ban- 
deiras  that  left  the  coast  had  but  the  vaguest  notions 
of  the  route  they  had  to  take  to  pass  across  the  hills. 
A  year  or  two,  or  even  three  years,  was  an  ordinary- 
time  for  them  to  be  away  wandering  amongst  the 
woods,  crossing  great  rivers,  scaling  hills,  harassed  by 
constant  Indian  attacks,  a  prey  to  every  kind  of  insect 
that  makes  life  a  burden  in  the  wilderness  of  never- 
ending  trees,  all  bound  together  with  lianas,  thorny 
and  hostile  to  mankind.  Gold  was  the  lodestar  that 
drew  them  into  the  interior,  but  for  full  one  hundred 
years  they  never  found  it,  till  at  last,  one  Bartolomeo 
Bueno  struck  the  rich  mining  regions  of  Goyaz,  after 
three  years  of  ineffectual  effort,  and  of  miseries.  Two 
of  the  best  known  Bandeirantes  were  Englishmen,  and 
figure  as  Antonio  Kinvet  and  Henrique  Barroway  in 
the  annals  of  the  time.* 

Antonio  and  Henrique  seem  to  have  been  what 
they  no  doubt  styled  "  free-traders,"  and  the  Brazilian 
probably  more  bluntly  called  pirates,  for  they  were 
taken  prisoners  in  a  "  Corsario  Inglez,"  and  long 
detained  in  prison,  either  on  account  of  their  heretical 
opinions  or  their  piratical  exploits,  or  an  admixture  of 
the  two.  Being  released,  they  joined  the  Bandeira  of 
Correa  de  Sa  in  1597,  and  had  incredible  adventures 
in  the  interior.  They  settled  down  at  last,  as  mere 
cattle  farmers,  and  probably  married  Tupi  women, 

*  "  Revista  do  Institute  Historico  do  Rio  de  Janeiro,"  vol.  ii.,  1878. 


38  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

especially  as  Pedro  Vas  de  Caminha,  in  his  celebrated 
letter  to  the  King  in  1580,  refers  to  these  ladies  as 
"  Mo9as  bem  gentis,"  and  says  in  grace  they  owed  but 
little  to  the  Lisbon  girls. 

By  slow  degrees  the  Sertao  was  peopled,  and  as  the 
climate  was  much  cooler  than  the  coast,  the  settlers 
gradually  began  to  raise  large  herds  of  cattle  and  of 
goats.  The  country,  although  not  open  as  in  the 
provinces  of  Parana  and  Rio  Grande,  was  rich  in  little 
plains  hemmed  in  by  belts  of  scrub.  These  were 
the  lands  now  known  as  the  Caatingas,  famous  for 
cattle-breeding.  Thus  the  interior  was  sooner  settled 
up  than  was  the  coast,  which  to  this  day,  as  is  to  be 
observed  even  outside  the  capital,  is  shut  off  from  the 
mountains  by  a  dense  belt  of  the  primeval  forest, 
giving  to  those  who  go  no  further  a  false  view  of  the 
country,  in  which  civilisation  seems  to  end  in  the  vast 
waves  of  jungle  that  stretch  on  every  side.  The  real 
Brazilians  of  the  old  school,  the  true  descendants  of 
the  intrepid  Bandeirantes,  are  only  to  be  found  in  the 
interior.  There  they  still  live  a  semi-patriarchal  life, 
and  are  but  little  touched  by  all  the  changes  which 
render  those  who  live  in  towns  subject  to  constant 
changes  that  cut  them  off  in  sentiment  from  the 
generations  that  preceded  them.  In  the  long-drawn- 
out  expeditions  of  the  Bandeirantes,  the  character  of 
the  Brazilian  race  must  have  been  slowly  forming, 
as  they  passed  their  lives  struggling  to  penetrate  the 
unknown  interior. 

As  European  women  seldom  or  never  accompanied 
the  first  discoverers,  they  formed  alliances  with  the 
Indians,  and  as  they  pushed  back  further  from  the 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  39 

coast,  much  fewer  opportunities  arose  to  mix  their 
blood  with  the  black  race,  and  thus  their  children 
nearly  all  became  what  were  termed  Mamalucos — that 
is,  half  white,  half  Indian — inheriting  on  the  one  side 
the  Portuguese  tendency  to  mysticism,  and  on  the 
other  the  melancholy  and  introspection  of  the  Indian, 
rendering  them  susceptible  to  that  fanaticism  which 
has  so  often  manifested  itself  in  Pernambuco  and 
Bahia  during  the  last  three  hundred  years. 

Indians    and   negroes    alike    seem    to     have    fallen 
victims     to     it,     manifesting     their     differing     racial 
characteristics   in    the   various   outbreaks  of  religious 
mania  that  have  taken  place.     These  outbursts  were, 
after  all,  not  so  much  to  be  wondered  at  when  the 
religious   history   of  Portugal   itself  is  studied   care- 
fully.     Nothing  of  the  same  kind  ever  took  place  in 
Spain;  the  materialistic  character  of  its  inhabitants  pre- 
served them  from  outbreaks  of  that  sort.     Hermits  and 
saints  Spain  has  produced  in  quantities,  but  Spanish 
history    does    not    seem    to    contain    any    account  of 
movements    such    as    that    headed    by    the    mystical 
fanatic  known   as  the    King   of  Penamacor,  or   that 
headed  by  the  man  who  styled  himself  the  King  of 
Ericeira.     Both  of  these  worthies,  followed  by  a  crowd 
of  their  disciples,  betook  themselves  to  solitary  places 
in  the  hills,  wandering  about,  subsisting  more  or  less 
on  locusts  and  wild  honey,  passing  the  day  in  listening 
to  their  leaders  preach,  the  night  often  in  singing  hymns 
and  in  debauchery.      Their  faith  was  quite  undoubted. 
Their    actions   did   not  seem    to   them  to  matter   so 
long  as  they  maintained  their  faith.     Thus  did  the 
followers  of   Montanus   and  Carpocrates  act,  in    the 


40  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

second  century.  "  Mysticism,"  Renan  says  in  his 
"  L'Eglise  Chretienne,"  "  has  always  been  a  moral 
danger,  for  it  allows  [people]  to  think  too  easily  that 
by  initiation  a  man  is  freed  from  ordinary  duties."* 

The  Gnostics  were  reported  to  have  held,  perhaps 
by  their  enemies,  that  things  of  the  flesh  are  fleshly, 
things  of  the  soul  are  spiritual.  This  axiom  once 
accepted,  any  kind  of  conduct  is  right ;  or,  perhaps, 
to  put  it  accurately,  all  kinds  of  conduct,  for  a  man 
who  conforms  to  it  may  be  an  ascetic  one  day  and 
a  libertine  the  next,  until  advancing  age  makes  him 
indifferent  to  both. 

Akin  to  these  outbreaks  of  religious  illumination 
under  the  two  "  Kings,"  was  the  politico-mystic  creed 
of  the  Sebastianists.f-  This  sect,  extinct  in  Portugal, 
in  Brazil  survived  down  to  the  year  1896,  and 
possibly  survives  up  to  the  present  day.  Thus  did  the 
Portuguese  come  well  prepared  for  spiritual  adventures 
to  the  New  World.  Mysterious  flames  that  issued 
from  caverns  in  the  hills,  coffins  that  floated  in  the  air 
over  the  palaces  of  kings,  shadowy  battalions  of  Moors 
clothed  in  burnouses,  who  at  due  intervals  appeared 

*  "  Le  mysticisme  a  toujours  et6  un  danger  moral,  car  il  laisse 
trop  facilement  entendre  que  par  I'initiation  en  est  dispense  des 
devoirs  ordinaires." — "L'Eglise  Chretienne,"  p.  162. 

t  In  my  youth  I  remember  an  old  man  who  was  believed  to  be  a 
Sebastianist,  but  he  may  have  had  as  much  madness  as  Sebastianism 
in  his  composition.  He  used  to  wander  up  and  down  the  Province 
of  the  Minho,  and  into  Galicia,  and  sit  upon  a  rock,  gazing  out  sea- 
ward for  the  coming  of  the  fleet  of  Don  Sebastian.  Such  faith 
certainly  might  have  removed  a  chain  of  mountains,  but  did  not,  as 
far  as  I  know,  bring  the  King  into  his  own  again.  However,  the 
poor  old  Sebastianist,  no  doubt,  had  his  reward,  for  faith  is  the  best 
anodyne  to  common  sense — that  common  sense  which  makes  the 
world  a  desert  to  Sebastianists. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  41 

and  often  joined  in  aerial  battles  with  Christian 
paladins,  were  but  as  commonplaces  in  their  lives. 
The  werwolf  (Lobis-Homen),  the  evening  sprite  (O 
tardo),  and  the  rest  of  the  remains  of  Pagan  polytheism, 
played  a  great  part  amongst  the  peasants  of  the 
Minho,  and  the  Traz  os  Montes,  as  they  do  even  to- 
day, imbuing  them  with  mysticism,  superstition,  or 
primitive  religion,  according  to  the  point  of  view  from 
which  they  are  approached. 

Nor  were  the  negroes  much  behind  them.  Their 
child-like,  bloody  creeds,  indeed,  took  a  far  different 
complexion.  For  them,  as  with  some  Christian  sects, 
the  blood  was  everything,  and  they  would  well  have 
understood  the  Scottish  minister  of  a  bygone  age  who 
said,  "  If  ye  tak'  out  the  blood  from  it,  I  would  na' 
tak'  the  trouble  of  carrying  the  Book  home." 

The  Hausa  negroes,  in  Bahia,  added  to  the 
Christian  creed  the  Jorubana  ritual,  and  introduced 
their  fetish  worship  into  the  services  of  the  Church, 
just  as  in  Haiti,  Santo  Domingo,  and  some  say  even  in 
Jamaica,  Obi  and  Voodoo  worship  still  prevail  amongst 
the  negroes  on  the  sly.  Those  who  have  seen  their 
agapemones  in  which  after  a  religious  service  they 
abandon  themselves  to  all  the  licence  of  the  phallic 
dance  at  their  Candombles,  can  testify  how  well 
adapted  are  they  for  all  kinds  of  religious  mania, 
enthusiasm,  revivalism,  or  anything  that  puts  them  into 
that  state  of  excitation  of  the  senses  in  which  the 
mind  ceases  to  work  or  works  subservient  to  the 
nerves.  In  Pajehu,  a  district  in  the  State  of  Pernam- 
buco,  there  stands  a  mountain  in  the  range  known  as 
the  Serra  Talhada,  which  dominates  the  country  for 


42  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

miles  on  every  side.  A  grey,  granitic  mass,  it  has 
something  majestic  in  its  appearance,  towering  up 
from  the  plain.  In  it  there  is  an  isolated  block, 
shaped  something  like  a  pulpit,  known  as  A  Pedra 
Bonita — that  is,  the  Pretty  Stone.  This  place  in  1837 
was  the  theatre  of  scenes  which  recall  all  the  worst 
atrocities  of  the  Ashantis,  in  their  devil  worship.*  In 
1837  a  Cafuz,  some  say  a  Mamaluco,  but  anyhow 
a  religious  monomaniac,  what  is  called  an  Illuminado 
in  Portuguese,  and  in  Spanish  an  Alumbrado,  col- 
lected most  of  the  population  of  the  neighbouring 
villages.  Who  he  was  is  still  uncertain,  but  evidently 
he  was  possessed  of  what  is  requisite  on  such  occasions 
— faith  in  himself  and  an  interminable  flow  of  words. 
It  is  possible  his  faith  was  genuine,  for  who  shall 
judge  the  heart .?  Of  one  thing  there  can  be  no  doubt: 
his  sermons  were  interminable.  Mounting  upon  the 
block  of  stone,  he  stood,  a  new  world,  John  of  Leyden, 
preaching  the  coming  of  the  King  Don  Sebastian,  he 
who  fell  at  the  field  of  Alcazar-el-Kebir.  He  fore- 
told that  the  stone  should  be  cut  into  steps  ;  not  cut 
with  any  earthly  tools,  but  smoothed  away  by  the 
shedding  of  the  blood  of  children.  Up  these  steps,  so 
miraculously  to  be  prepared,  surrounded  by  his  guard 
of  honour,  dressed  in  armour,  the  King,  who  had  been 
dead  three  hundred  years,  should  ascend  and  come 
into  his  own  again,  reigning  in  Portugal  and  in  Brazil, 
and  bountifully  rewarding  those  who  had  been  faithful 
to  him,  and  by  their  faith  contributed  to  his  dis- 
enchantment.     No    more    was    wanted;    the    whole 

■^  Euclydes  da  Cunha  describes  it  in  his  book,  "  Os  Sertoes,"  Rio 
de  Janeiro,  191 7. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  43 

Sertao,  from  Pajehu  right  to  the  Rio  das  Egoas,  in 
Pernambuco,  Piauhy,  Bahia  and  Ceara,  was  all 
convulsed.  A  nervous  agitation  seemed  to  com- 
municate itself  to  everybody.  The  rude  Vaqueiros, 
all  dressed  in  leather,  with  their  stiff  coats  made  of 
deer's  hide,  their  long  hard  leggings,  and  their  low 
round  hats,  giving  them  an  air  of  medieval  men-at- 
arms,  arrived  from  every  side.  Mounted  upon  their 
fiery  little  horses,  and  riding  at  the  medieval  amble 
— which  is  so  easy  that  the  rider  may  carry  in  his  hand 
a  glass  of  water  and  spill  no  drop  of  it — bearing  their 
flint-lock  wide -mouthed  Bacamortes  across  their 
saddles,  girt  with  a  rusty  sword,  or  with  the  long, 
sharp-pointed  knife  they  call  a  jacare,*  or  faca  de 
Parnyba  stuck  in  their  sashes,  they  came,  and  then 
sat  sideways  on  their  horses  listening  to  the  preacher, 
and  believed.  Belief  with  them  was  easy  as  it  so  often 
is  if  the  thing  to  be  believed  is  unbelievable.  Negroes 
and  half-castes  of  all  shades  of  colour,  Indians,  Cafuces, 
Mamalucos,  Caboclos,  and  men  of  every  one  of  the 
bewildering  shades  of  colour,  flocked  to  the  Pretty 
Stone.  A  multitude  of  women,  all  a  prey  to  the 
mysterious  agitation  which  in  such  cases,  whether 
at  revivals  in  Port  Glasgow,  camp  meetings  in 
the  United  States,  or  pilgrimages  to  holy  places  in 
Calabria,  seems  to  transform  them,  making  them  just 
as  irresponsible  as  the  Bacchantes  of  the  older  world, 
came  through  the  mountain  passes,  followed  the  trails 
through  virgin  forests  and  assembled  to  hear  the  word 

"^  Jacare  is  a  Guarani  word,  and  means  alligator.  Faca  de 
Parnhyba=  knife  from  Parnhyba.  A  blunderbuss  in  Portuguese  is 
called  a  "  Bracamorte." 


44  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

preached  at  the  wondrous  pulpit  made  by  no  earthly 
hands.  Unluckily  they  brought  their  children  with 
them.  Then,  roused  to  a  religious  frenzy  beyond 
belief,  as  they  stood  listening  to  the  words  of  the 
illuminated  Cafuz  or  Mamaluco — for  history  has  not 
preserved  his  name — women  strove  with  one  another 
Vv'ho  should  be  the  first  to  offer  up  her  child,  so  that 
its  blood  should  split  the  rock  and  form  the  sacred 
stair,  by  which  the  King,  the  long  lamented  Don 
Sebastian,  should  ascend  in  glory,  bringing  back  peace 
and  plenty  upon  earth. 

A  common-sense  but  accurate  historian*  says  that 
for  days  the  rocks  ran  blood.  This  man,  devoid  of 
faith  and  quite  incapable  of  rising  to  the  comprehen- 
sion of  heights  to  which  the  Cafuz  (or  Mamaluco) 
had  transported  his  rapt  hearers,  informs  us  when  the 
*'  lugubrious  farce  "-f*  was  over  that  so  great  was  the 
quantity  of  blood  shed  by  the  faithful  the  place 
became  pestiferous  and  had  to  be  deserted,  until  a 
purifying  Nature  worked  a  cure  upon  it.  The  events 
which  happened  at  A  Pedra  Bonita  were  perhaps  the 
most'  appalling  of  any  in  the  history  of  Brazil ;  but 
long  before  that,  in  the  seventeenth  century,  in  the 
mountain  chain  of  Piquara9a  near  Jacobina,  in  Bahia, 
a  missionary,  one  Apollonio  de  Todi,  coming  from  a 
mission  in  the  north,  was  so  much  struck  with  the 
resemblance  of  the  mountain  to  Mount  Calvary  that 
he  resolved  to  build  a  chapel  there.  Luckily  for  the 
children  of  those  times  the   missionary  was  neither 

■^  Araripe  Junior,  in  his  "  Reino  Encantado." 
t  "  Lugubre  far9a  "  is  the  term  used  by  Euclydes  da  Cunha,  in 
his  description  of  the  sacrifice  in  his  book  "  Os  Sertoes." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  45 

a  Cafuz  or  Mamaluco,  but  only  a  well-meaning, 
visionary  friar.  His  first  proceeding  was  to  change 
the  name  Piquara9a  to  Monte  Santo.  Then,  preach- 
ing to  the  rude  Sertanejos,  he  stirred  them  up,  not 
to  the  pitch  of  human  sacrifice,  but  to  assist  him  in 
his  scheme.  So  well  he  worked,  and  so  well  was  he 
seconded  by  the  impressionable  folk  of  the  Sertao,  that 
in  a  short  time  on  the  summit  of  the  highest  peak  an 
enormous  church  was  built. 

Up  to  it,  cut  out  of  the  solid  rock,  this  time  with 
ordinary  picks  and  shovels,  a  Via  Sacra  of  three  kilo- 
metres led,  with  five-and-twenty  little  oratories  as 
stations  of  the  cross.  Nothing  was  wanted  but  a 
miracle  to  make  the  place  respectable  and  to  bring 
pilgrims  to  it  from  all  the  country  round.  The 
faithful  Sertanejos  had  not  long  to  wait,  for  in  due 
course  some  mystic  letters  of  gigantic  size,  an  A,  an 
L  and  S,  topped  by  a  cross,  were  found  cut  in  the 

rock. 

The  Sertanejos  did  the  rest,  throwing  their  faith 
and  simple  piety  into  the  common  stock;  thus  Monte 
Santo  soon  became  renowned. 

In  Holy  Week,  when  from  remote  villages  in  the 
Sertao  the  Vaqueiros  and  their  families  crowd  to  the 
holy  fair,  the  scene  recalls  the  Middle  Ages.  Such 
orgasms  of  piety,  such  wild  intensity  of  faith,  are 
rarely  to  be  seen  in  a  world  where  the  educated  turn 
for  their  spiritual  consolation  rather  to  crystal-gazing 
or  to  palmistry  than  to  such  vulgar  superstitions  as 
satisfy  the  simple  herdsmen  of  the  Sertao. 

The  scene  is  marvellous,  with  its  myriad  camp  fires, 
its    herds  of  horses    grazing   loose  or   picketed,  the 


46     LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 

strange,  old-fashioned,  medieval  types  of  men,  and  the 
vast  panorama  extending  over  leagues  of  mountains, 
oceans  of  tropic  forest,  and  with  the  glittering  sea  in 
the  far  distance,  its  surf-lashed  beach  encircled  round 
by  palms.  Preacher  succeeds  to  preacher,  and  under 
the  w^ild  eloquence  of  some  illuminated  friar,  or  inspired 
herdsman,  by  degrees  excitement  stirs  the  multitude 
into  an  excess  of  pious  fervour,  that  recalls  scenes  that 
took  place  when  first  the  faith  was  spread  amongst  the 
Gentiles,  or  when  Mohammed  stirred  the  souls  of  the 
rude  Arabs  in  the  wilds  of  the  Hejaz. 

The  friar  Apollonio  had  no  successor  of  like  genius 
with  himself,  although  at  intervals  some  Mamaluco  or 
Cafuz  arises  and  strives  to  emulate  him. 

The  last  and  greatest  of  them  all  was  that  Antonio 
Conselheiro  whose  life  and  miracles,  as  the  phrase 
goes  in  Lives  of  saints,- 1  hope  this  Introduction  may 
explain,  or  at  least  make  possible  of  comprehension  to 
those  who  never  heard  of  him,  or  of  the  curious  region 
where  he  lived,  preached,  and  succeeded  for  a  brief 
interval,  and  then,  having  set  up  for  a  redeemer,  as 
the  Castilian  bitter  saying  has  it,  met  the  redeemer's 
fate. 


CHAPTER  I 

In  1889,  when  the  Emperor  Don  Pedro  II.  gave  up 
his  throne  and  the  republic  was  proclaimed,  it  was 
inevitable  that  in  remote  and  medieval  districts,  such 
as  the  Sertao,  there  would  be  still  left  many,  hostile  to 
the  new  form  of  government. 

Not  only  were  the  new  ideas  repugnant  to  them, 
but  they  were  almost  incomprehensible  to  men  who, 
though  the  actual  government  was  never  very  manifest 
to  them  in  their  daily  lives,  still  held  the  patriarchal 
theory  of  life  in  its  entirety. 

It  is  not  to  be  supposed  they  had  any  excessive 
loyalty  towards  Don  Pedro  as  a  man  ;  but  they  most 
probably  conceived  him  as  something  indispensable. 
Just  as  their  priests  looked  to  the  Pope  as  their 
spiritual  head  and  chief,  without,  in  the  Sertao, 
troubling  a  great  deal  as  to  his  existence,  so  did  the 
Sertanejos  look  upon  their  Emperor.  The  priests, 
moreover,  would  be  certain  to  inculcate  in  them  a 
respect  for  monarchy,  partly  from  personal,  partly  from 
ecclesiastical  feelings  of  use  and  wont.  The  Church, 
we  know,  adapts  itself  to  every  form  of  government, 
seeing  at  once  that  if  it  can  bend  or  enslave  (according 
to  the  reader's  point  of  view)  the  mind,  all  the  rest  is 
merely  leather  and  prunella,  and  that  the  republican 

47 


48  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

may  contribute  to  the  offertory  as  freely  as  the  best 
believer  in  the  Divine  right  of  kings. 

This  feeling  of  uneasiness  in  regard  to  the  new 
government,  the  mysticism  of  the  people  as  shown  in 
the  belief  in  the  return  to  earth  of  Don  Sebastian,  and 
the  fear  that  the  republic  meant  the  destruction  of  all 
religion,  tended  to  make  the  dwellers  in  the  Sertao 
especially  susceptible  to  any  movement,  religious  or 
political  alike,  during  the  time  between  the  abdication 
of  the  Emperor  and  the  firm  establishment  of  the  new 
government.  Out  of  the  depths  of  superstition  and  of 
violence,  Antonio  Conselheiro  arose  to  plunge  the 
whole  Sertao  into  an  erethism  of  religious  mania  and 
of  blood. 

His  ancestors  were  men  of  violence,  although  no 
doubt  fervent  believers  ;  subservient  to  their  priests  ; 
singers  of  "  novenas  "  in  their  houses,  honourers  of 
their  fathers  and  their  mothers,  and  in  fact  not  much 
unlike  the  Scottish  Highlanders  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  except  that  they  were  far  more  fervent 
in  their  faith.  To  complete  the  likeness,  the 
Emperor's  writ  had  as  little  force  in  the  Sertao  as  had 
the  King's  beyond  the  Pass  of  Aberfoyle  in  the  days 
of  Rob  Roy. 

Though  in  Bahia  modern  life  v/as  well  established, 
with  telegraphs  and  telephones  and  public  lighting  ot 
the  streets  and  tramways  only  two  hundred  miles 
away,  these  things  were  quite  unknown  and  almost 
unsuspected  by  the  ordinary  man.  The  Sertanejo 
when  he  went  to  town — and  town  to  him  was  not 
Bahia,  but  Joazeiro,  Jacobina,  Queimadas,  or  some 
other  little  local  centre — passed  his  sword  between  his 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  49 

saddle  girths,  and  either  wore  a  pair  of  antique  pistols 
at  his  saddle  bow,  or  carried  in  his  hand  a  flintlock 
blunderbuss.  He  never  stirred  from  home  except 
armed  to  the  teeth,  and  even  in  his  home,  when  he  put 
on  his  hat,  he  also  stuck'his  "jacare  "*  into  his  belt. 

So  v/as  the  Highlander  of  old  a  being  distinct  from 
any  Lowlander  by  the  fact  of  always  going  armed. 
As  Addison  and  Rob  Roy  McGregor  flourished  at  the 
same  time,  so  did  Antonio  Conselheiro  and  the 
scientific  Emperor,  Don  Pedro  de  Alcantara,  pursue 
their  differing  avocations  at  the  same  moment,  in 
Brazil.  As  often  happens  in  back-lying-f*  districts, 
powerful  families  pursued  their  feuds,  and  levied  war 
upon  each  other.  Such  was  the  custom  up  to  the 
other  day,  in  Western  Texas,  Kentucky,  in  Calabria, 
in  the  Province  of  Valencia  in  Spain,  and  in  Corsica. 
Although  the  Sertao  extends  to  several  States  of  the 
Republic  of  Brazil,  as  Bahia,  Pernambuco,  Ceara  and 
Piauhy,  the  customs  are  identical  in  all  the  States, 
and  the  Sertanejo  rather  looks  upon  himself  as  such, 
than  as  an  inhabitant  of  the  different  provinces.  Thus, 
in  the  Sertao  of  Ceara  in  the  wild  districts  that  lie 
between  Quixeramobim  and  Tamboril,  the  families  of 
the  Maciel  and  Araujos  kept  all  the  country  in  con- 
fusion with  their  feuds.  Antonio  Conselheiro  sprang 
from  the  family  of  Maciel. 

The  MacielsJ  were  poor  but  numerous,  and  main- 
tained themselves  by  cattle-raising  upon  a  minor  scale. 
They  seem  to  have  been  also  small  landowners,  and,  as 

•^  Long  knife.     Literally,  "alligator" — from  the  Guarani  word 
meaning  an  alligator. 

t  This  Scottism  avoids  the  odious  German  "hinterland." 
X  "  Maciel,"  plural  "  Macieis  "  in  Portuguese. 

4 


so  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

contemporaries  aver,  all  of  them  active  and  athletic  men, 
living  the  ordinary  life  of  the  Vaqueiros,  dressing  in 
leather  and  always  going  armed.  The  Araujos  presum- 
ably were  but  little  superior  to  them  in  education 
and  in  culture.  Their  daily  life  was  similar  to 
that  of  the  Maciels — their  dress,  their  habit  of  always 
carrying  arms,  and  their  religious  faith.  The  difference 
was  in  their  possessions,  for  the  Araujos  clan  were 
landowners  and  cattle-breeders  on  a  large  scale. 

Their  houses  probably  were  such  as  I  have  often 

seen  throughout  the  country  districts  of  Brazil.     They 

stood  most  likely  surrounded  by  a  clump  of  mango  or 

of  orange  trees,  long,  low  and  yellow,  with  red-tiled 

roofs  such  as  one  still  can   see  in  Brazil  and  in  the 

remoter  parts  of  Portugal,  and  dated  possibly  from  the 

early  days  of  the  settlement  of  the  Sertao.     Behind 

them  stretched  a  field  or  two  of  Indian  corn  or  man- 

dioca  (known  as  a  "  roza  "),  with  stumps  of  trees,  cut 

off  or    burned,  dotted    throughout    the    crop.     The 

Caatinga*  probably  came  close  up  to  the  corrals  for 

cows,  on  one  side,  and  at  the  front  a  little  plain,  studded 

with  stunted  palms,  stretched  out ;  and  on  it  fed  their 

cattle,   their    mules  and    horses,  and   probably  some 

goats. 

There  may  have  been  a  little  grove  either  of 
bananas  or  guayabas,  and  a  tall  palm  or  two  about 
the  house.  From  the  corrals  an  acrid  smell  would  be 
wafted  on  the  air,  not  disagreeable  when  you  are  used 
to  it,  and  not  unlike  the  smell  of  peat  that  hangs 
about  a  Highland  shieling  in  the  remoter  glens.     The 

*  Bush,  in  Guarani. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  51 

house  itself  most  certainly  had  something  Oriental  in 
its  configuration  and  its  air.  Passing  the  fence  and 
the  various  hitching-posts  where  you  tied  up  your 
horse,  you  Came  to  the  front  door,  made  like  a  door 
in  Portugal  or  Spain,  to  revolve  upon  a  solid  hinge 
stuck  into  a  socket  in  the  lintel — a  fashion  w^hich  the 
Moors  had  left  in  the  Peninsula.  In  default  of  iron, 
the  lock  most  likely  was  of  wood,  just  as  locks  used  to 
be  in  Fez,  ten  or  twelve  years  ago.  The  front  door 
opened  to  the  saguan,  the  passage  to  the  inner  court, 
found  in  all  ancient  houses,  whether  in  Portugal  or 
Spain,  or  in  their  colonies.  Rooms  lay  to  right  and 
left  of  the  courtyard,  and  in  them  there  would  be  two 
or  three  ancient  leather-seated,  high-backed  chairs, 
around  a  table  of  hard,  dark-coloured  wood.  Upon 
it  stood  a  porous  water-vessel  with  a  dew  exuding 
from  its  sides,  flanked  by  a  heavy  silver  cup  or  two. 
Six  or  seven  Lives  of '  saints,  printed  at  Coimbra, 
and  bound  in  vellum,  with  ties  and  eyelets  (to 
which  shells  worn  smooth  by  handling  acted  as 
buttons),  together  with  a  Book  of  Hours,  would 
form  the  library. 

Two  or  three  negro  slaves  and  a  dozen  yellow 
dogs  were  certain  to  be  lounging  near  the  front  door, 
or  just  outside  the  fence.  To  complete  the  Oriental 
air,  you  might  have  stayed  a  week  within  the  house 
and  never  seen  the  women,  although  you  heard  them 
and  felt  certain  that  they  had  reconnoitred  you  a 
hundred  times,  through  holes  you  could  not  see. 

The  Araujos,  or  any  family  who  owned  a  house 
such  as  that  I  have  just  described,  would  live  in 
homely  style,  but  plentifully.     Their  flocks  and  herds. 


52  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

with  their  tilled  fields  and  groves  of  oranges  and  of 
bananas,  provided  them  with  food.     Food  was  abun- 
dant, if  not  luxurious,  for  every  now  and  then  they 
killed  a  bullock,  drying  the  best  part  of  the  meat  in 
long,  thin  strips,  which  was  called  "  charqui  "  in  the 
plains,  and  in  the  Sertao  "  carne  do  vento,"  which 
literally  means  "  wind  meat,"  or  meat  dried  in   the 
wind.     This  meat  dried  in  the  sun  or  wind  is  not  un- 
palatable when  fried  or  done  up  in  a  stew  that  the 
Brazilians  call  "  angu,"  composed  of  charqui  and  of 
rice  with  bits  of  pumpkin  on  the  top  of  it.     The 
whole  is  piled  up  in  a  pyramid  upon  the  dish,  and 
looks  a  little  like  the  stews  used  by  the  Moors  through- 
out North  Africa.     The  men  assembled  in  the  dining- 
room  and  sat  about  a  long,  rough  table  in  patriarchal 
style,  the  elders  at  the  top.     Mulatto  girls,  with  their 
chemises  slipping  off  their  shoulders  and  shoes  like 
those  worn  by  the  Moors  that  slap  upon  the  ground 
with  the  movement  of  the  foot,  bore  in  the  dinner, 
carrying  it  high  above  their  heads  in  platters  made 
of   earthenware   or   wood,   or   perhaps   silver   in   the 
richer  families.     The  stew  discussed,  black  beans  and 
bacon  followed;  this  dish  is  called  "  feijao,"  and  takes 
the  place  that  porridge  does  in  Scotland,  the  soup  in 
France,  or  macaroni  with  Italians,  in  every  household 
in  Brazil.     Fine  mandioca  flour  is  powdered  over  it 
to  make  it  thicker  and  more  oalatable.     This  flour  is 
often  called  "farinha  do  pao,"  that   is,  the  flour  of 
wood,  and  tastes  like  sawdust  to  palates  not  attuned 
to  it,  but  is  most  nourishing.     After  the  beans  and 
bacon    and    the    stev/,     rice     boiled    in     milk    and 
powdered   thick  with   cinnamon  was  served,  just  as 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  53 

day  follows  night,  and  quite  as  certainly.  Sometimes 
this  would  be  varied  by  "  cangica,"  that  is,  maize  boiled 
in  milk,  held  a  great  delicacy,  and  so  much  appreciated 
in  Brazil  that  country  people  have  a  saying,  "Cangica 
knocks  out  every  kind  of  dish."*  When  all  was  over, 
home-made  cigars  or  cigarettes,  rolled  in  the  husks  of 
corn,  were  lighted,  and  a  girl  came  in  carrying  a  silver 
basin  full  of  water  and  a  long  towel  with  fringed  ends 
to  dry  the  hands  upon,  after  they  were  washed  in 
Oriental  style  by  pouring  water  upon  them.  Strong 
native  coffee  and  "  cachaza,"  that  is,  white  rum  made 
from  the  sugar-cane,  most  probably  at  home,  would 
finish  the  repast.  Then  the  guests  would  retire  each 
to  his  hamac  for  the  siesta,  which  occupied  an  hour 
or  two.  After  the  evening  meal,  they  all  assembled 
to  sing  the  Rosary,  and  then  retired  to  rest.  If  in  the 
morning  after  you  got  up  (always  at  daylight)  you 
met  a  negro  either  in  the  passages  or  just  outside  the 
door,  he  seized  your  hand  and  kissed  it,  or  asked  your 
blessing,  which  you  bestowed  as  solemnly  as  possible; 
for  to  have  refused  would  have  been  a  dire  offence, 
both  to  the  man  himself  and  to  good  manners ;  and 
on  good  manners  the  older  generation  of  Brazilians, 
so  to  speak,  built  their  Church. 

Few  flowers  were  grown,  except  in  the  richest 
houses,  and  even  then  they  generally  were  the  Marvel 
of  Peru,  or  some  luxuriant  creeper  that  climbed  upon 
the  wails.  Pumpkins  were  the  chief  vegetables 
upon  the  cattle  farms,  though  near  the  coast  they 
were  more  plentiful,  as  sweet  potatoes,  okross,  and 
many  others,  familiar  to  Brazil. 

*  "  A  cangica  borra  Todo." 


54  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

These  patriarchal  folk,  though  they  lived  simply, 
were  full  of  pride  of  race  and  family,  and  kept  a  hold 
upon  the  local  magistracy  with  a  grip  of  iron.  Thus 
when  the  Araujos  found  their  ascendancy  was  not 
acknowledged  by  the  Maciels,  their  fury  knew  no 
bounds. 

Colonel  Joao  Brigido  dos  Santos  has  left  us  an 
account  of  how  the  feud  began,  and  it  is  interesting  as 
it  serves  to  show  from  what  stock  Antonio  Conselheiro 
sprang.  In  the  fashion  of  most  of  these  clan 
feuds,  whether  in  the  Scottish  Highlands  of  old  or 
elsewhere,  the  carrying  off  of  cattle  furnished  the  first 
excuse. 

Colonel  dos  Santos  describes  the  heads  of  the  family 
of  Maciel  as  "  vigorous  and  sympathetic  men,  of  good 
appearance,  truthful  and  serviceable,"  and  hints  that 
the  accusations  brought  against  them  by  the  Araujos 
were  not  based  on  proofs,  but  merely  formed  a 
pretext,  and  that  the  real  reason  of  their  enmity  was 
that  the  Maciels,  though  poor,  contested  the  supremacy 
of  the  richer  family.  That  may  have  been  ;  but  what 
is  certain  is  that  the  Araujos  for  real  or  fancied 
wrongs  got  all  their  clan  together  and  fell  upon  their 
foes.  Contrary  to  general  expectation,  they  were 
repulsed  with  loss. 

The  Maciels  had  gathered  all  their  partisans  and 
were  prepared  to  carry  fire  and  sword  into  the  terri- 
tories of  the  enemy.  As  all  this  happened  in  1833,  it 
gives  a  picture  of  the  life  in  the  Sertao  at  that  time,  and 
is  identical  with  that  upon  the  Scottish  border  in  the 
days  of  James  I.  Substitute  Johnstone  and  Jardine  for 
Araujo   and    Maciel,    and    take    the  scene  from  the 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  ss 

drought-cursed  Sertao  to  the  damp  wilds  of  Durisdeer 
or  Annandale,  and  the  resemblance  is  complete. 

The  Araujos,  after  their  defeat,  a  prey  to  rage  and 
disappointment,  and  either  fearing  or  being  unwilling 
to  engage  in  further  open  strife,  looked  about  for  men 
to  whom  to  delegate  their  vengeance  and  their  hate. 
Such  men  are  never  hard  to  find,  even  to-day,  in  the 
Sertao. 

Jose  Joaquin  de  Menezes,  a  man  from  Pernambuco, 
renowned  for  deeds  of  violence  and  blood,  and  a  well- 
known  bravo,  one  Vicente  Lopes  of  Aracaguassu, 
offered  their  services.  These  rascals,  under  the 
leadership  of  a  certain  Sylvestre  Rodrigues  Veras,  a 
relation  of  Araujo  da  Costa,  chief  of  the  clan,  collected 
all  their  friends  and  followers  and  fell  upon  their 
enemies  by  night.  They  stealthily  surrounded  the 
house  where  lived  the  chief  of  the  Maciels.  As  all 
resistance  was  impossible,  the  Araujos  sent  in  a  man 
to  say  that  they  would  spare  the  lives  of  the  Maciels 
if  they  surrendered  without  fight.  They,  taken  by 
surprise,  agreed,  after  they  had  secured  a  promise  of 
their  lives.  As  was  to  be  expected,  the  promise  was 
not  kept.  At  the  end  of  the  first  day's  journey,  the 
prisoners  were  murdered  in  cold  blood.  Amongst 
them  was  Antonio  Maciel,  the  headman  of  his  clan. 
This  man  was  a  grandfather  of  Antonio  Conselheiro, 
and  appears  to  have  been  quite  innocent  of  the  cattle 
robberies  of  which  he  was  accused.  So,  at  least,  says 
Manoel  Ximenes  in  his  "  Memorias,"  almost  the  only 
documentary  evidence  of  these  curious  events  that  has 
been  preserved  to  us. 

Antonio's  uncle,  Miguel  Carlos,  managed  to  escape. 


56  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Bound  as  he  was  and  with  his  legs  secured  under  his 
horse's  belly,  his  flight  seems  difficult  to  account  for, 
unless,  as  happened  to  Rob  Roy  McGregor  in  a  like 
plight,  he  had  a  friend  amongst  his  adversaries  to 
untie  his  bonds  for  him. 

Whether  this  was  the  case  or  not,  one  thing  is 
certain,  that  the  pursuit  of  him  v/as  instant  and 
v/ell  sustained.  The  pursuers  all  were  mounted  on 
their  best  horses,  and  all  were  men  accustomed  to 
every  phase  of  frontier  life.  As  I  have  heard  a 
tracker  in  the  upper  provinces  of  the  Argentine 
Republic  say  of  himself,  to  them  "  the  desert  was  an 
open  book."  Most  likely  all  of  them  could  follow  up 
a  trail  at  a  short  "lope,"  without  dismounting,  when  it 
ran  clear  on  open  ground.  To  such  men,  all  spurred  on 
by  hope  of  vengeance  and  by  hate,  the  capture  of  the 
fugitive  was  a  certainty.  He,  having  been  joined  by 
his  sister,  as  good  a  frontierman  as  he  himself,  and 
^  skilled  markswoman,  employed  all  the  ruses  of  a 
hunted  man  upon  the  frontier.  The  brother  and 
sister  waded  down  streams,  turned  back  upon  the 
trail,  confused  it  by  treading  in  each  other's  footsteps, 
and  by  dragging  boughs  in  their  hands  behind  them. 
They  fired  the  grass  in  front  of  them  and  crossed  the 
burnt  up  patches,  stepping  on  stones  and  branches  of 
burnt  trees.  AH  was  in  vain  ;  at  last,  exhausted,  they 
hid  themselves  in  a  deserted  hut. 

In  a  short  time  their  enemies  appeared  like  hounds 
on  a  hot  scent.  Day  was  just  breaking,  when  the 
intrepid  brother  and  sister  stood  at  bay,  determining  to 
sell  their  lives  at  the  best  price. 

Miguel  Carlos  was  wounded  in  the  foot.     In  spite 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  57 

of  that,  with  his  gun  in  his  hand  and  a  sharp-pointed 
knife  between  his  teeth,  he  stood  before  his  sister  in 
the  door  to  face  his  enemies.  His  first  shot  killed  one 
Theotonio,  whose  body  fell  against  the  open  door, 
preventing  it  from  being  closed.  As  she  was  struggling 
to  close  it,  and  drag  away  the  body  of  the  dead  man,  the 
sister  fell,  pierced  by  a  bullet  in  the  breast.  Then 
Pedro  Veras,  the  leader  of  the  attacking  party,  rushed 
forward,  only  to  fail  pierced  by  a  load  of  slugs  iired 
from  a  blunderbuss  from  the  inside  of  the  hut.  This 
gave  Miguel  Carlos  a  moment's  respite,  which  he 
took  full  advantage  of,  maintaining  a  hot  fire.  The 
next  act  was  that  to  be  expected  in  a  frontier  fight 
— the  attackers  managed  to  set  the  roof  on  fire. 

The  man  inside,  now  rendered  desperate,  also 
recurred  to  an  old  frontier  ruse.  Filling  an  earthen 
jar  with  water,  he  dashed  it  on  the  flames.  Immedi- 
ately a  dense  steam  arose.  Covered  by  it,  and  firing 
as  he  ran,  his  knife  in  his  left  hand,  he  sprang  across 
the  body  of  his  sister,  and  bounding  through  the 
circle  of  his  foes,  disappeared  into  the  woods.  Either 
the  besiegers  had  had  enough  of  slaughter,  or 
Miguel  Carlos  Maciel  had  covered  up  his  tracks  so 
well  that  they  did  not  pursue  him,  but  if  they  did  they 
failed  to  find  his  trail.  It  may  be  that  they  held  him 
not  worthy  of  pursuit,  as  a  mere  "Pe  Rapado,"  literally 
a  shaven  foot,  or  vagabond,  not  able  to  do  harm. 

In  this  they  were  deceived,  for  some  months  after- 
wards, one  of  the  Araujo  family  on  his  way  to  church 
to  marry  a  rich  lady  of  those  parts  fell  mortally 
wounded  by  a  bullet,  fired  from  an  ambush  by  Miguel 
Carlos,  who  thus  avenged  his  sister  and  his  friends. 


58  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Another  sister,  Helena  Maciel,  then  joined  him  and 
was  invaluable  to  him  by  giving  due  notice  of  his 
enemies'  designs. 

Brother  and  sister  lived  hidden  in  the  v^oods, 
although  at  times  they  came  out  boldly  and  killed  or 
tried  to  kill  such  of  their  enemies  as  exposed  them- 
selves. On  one  occasion,  in  a  little  country  store, 
Miguel  Carlos  met  a  man  w^ho  he  suspected  was  a 
spy  set  on  him  by  his  enemies.  He  instantly  made 
friends  with  him,  and  as  they  rode  out  of  the  town,  at 
the  first  corner,  Miguel  Carlos  buried  a  knife  between 
his  shoulders  and  left  him  dead  upon  the  road. 

Innumerable  were  the  adventures  and  crimes  in 
which  Miguel  Carlos  and  his  sister  were  involved,  but 
as  the  swimmer  in  the  end  is  always  taken  by  the  sea 
—  at  least,  so  says  the  Arab  proverb — his  fate  was 
certain,  in  such  a  place  as  the  Sertao. 

One  day  he  went  to  bathe  in  a  stream  near  a  little 
town  called  Cotovello,  accompanied  by  several  of  his 
friends.  After  their  bathe  they  sat  down  on  the  sand 
to  dress  themselves,  when  suddenly  out  of  a  thicket  of 
tall  reeds  appeared  a  band  of  the  Araujos,  who  opened 
fire  upon  them.  His  friends,  seizing  their  clothes, 
plunged  into  the  thickest  of  the  reeds,  leaving  Miguel 
Carlos  alone  upon  the  beach. 

Dressed  only  in  his  drawers  and  with  a  knife  held 
in  his  hand,  he  ran  towards  a  house  amidst  a  shower 
of  bullets,  which  all  missed  their  mark.  He  reached 
the  house,  opened  the  door,  and  fell  mortally  wounded, 
but  still  holding  fast  his  knife.  One  Manoel  de 
Araujo,  chief  of  the  band  of  murderers,  stabbed  him  as 
he  lay.     With  his  last  breath  Miguel  Carlos  bounded 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  59 

to  his  feet,  and  buried  his  knife  deep  in  his  adversary's 
throat. 

The  two  fell  dead,  one  on  the  other,  and  Helena 
Maciel,  rushing  up  fully  armed,  stamped  on  the  face  of 
her  brother's  murderer  and  managed  to  escape.  For 
long  she  ranged  the  country  like  a  fury,  and  once  more 
murdered  another  victim  to  avenge  her  brother's 
death.  This  was  the  last  of  her  exploits,  and  this  time 
she  did  not  execute  her  vengeance  personally,  but  left 
it  to  a  band  of  paid  assassins,  who  fell  upon  a  relation 
of  the  Araujos  and  beat  him  so  barbarously  that  he 
died.  Helena  appears  to  have  been  satisfied  that  she 
had  done  enough,  and  lived  quite  unmolested  to  a  good 
old  age. 

The  quarrel  still  went  on,  and  the  two  families  for 
many  years  slaughtered  each  other  quite  impartially. 
One  of  the  few  survivors  was  Vicente  Mendes 
Maciel,  father  of  Antonio  Conselheiro,  who  does  not 
appear  to  have  been  engaged  in  following  up  the 
feud. 

Colonel  Joao  Brigido*  describes  him  as  an  irascible 
man,  but  of  great  probity,  half  a  visionary  and  sus- 
picious in  the  extreme.  He  must  have  been  a  man 
of  some  capacity,  though  quite  illiterate,  in  spite  of 
which  he  entered  largely  into  business,  keeping 
all  his  accounts  and  records  of  his  affairs  by  memory, 
as  he  could  neither  read  nor  write  nor  had  the  slightest 
knowledge  of  arithmetic.  In  such  surroundings  did 
the  young  Antonio  Mendes  Maciel  grow  up,  seeing  on 
every  side  of  him  deeds  of  violence  and  blood.  The 
country  where  he  lived  was  certainly  a  curious  school 

*  "Crimes  celebres  do  Ceara.     Os  Araujos  e  Macieis." 


6o      LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 

for  a  young  man,  such  as  he  was,  to  have  been  born 
into.  His  uncles  all  had  been  concerned  in  the 
lierce  feud  with  the  Araujos,  and  thus  no  doubt 
he  imbibed  a  hatred  of  the  rich.  Some  of  his 
nearest  relatives  had  fallen  in  the  feud,  and  so  his 
earliest  recollections  must  have  been  tinged  with 
thoughts  of  vengeance.  At  the  same  time,  most  of 
the  combatants,  upon  both  sides,  were  probably  men 
imbued  v^^ith  deep  religious  feelings,  of  a  peculiar 
kind.  They  all  believed  in  omens,  and  in  a  way  were 
mystics,  or  at  the  least  were  visionaries,  seeing  super- 
natural intervention  in  natural  events,  and  with  the 
names  of  Jesus  and  the  saints  always  upon  their  lips. 

All  this  prepared  him,  without  doubt,  for  a  life 
singularly  unlike  that  of  a  man  born  in  the  nineteenth 
century.  His  education  was  superior  to  that  of  his 
relations,  received  most  likely  from  the  priests,  who 
certainly  would  inculcate  hatred  of  republican  ideas, 
fealty  to  monarchy,  and  a  regard  to  old  traditions  of 
whatever  kind  they  were.  His  reading  certainly  was 
confined  to  Lives  of  saints,  books  on  religion,  and  the 
breviary. 

Sebastianism  he  found  in  the  air  of  the  Sertao. 
Nobody  questioned  it,  and  the  whole  life  he  led  drew 
him  to  mysticism.  All  seems  to  have  worked  to- 
gether to  prepare  a  man  certain  to  be  remarkable  in 
the  Sertao,  when  once  he  had  emerged  from  his 
obscurity. 


CHAPTER  II 

Antonio  Vicente  Mendes  Maciel  was  born  in 
the  Sertao  of  Ceara  in  a  little  town  called  Quixer- 
amobim,  somewhere  about  the  year  1 842  ;  but  the 
date  is  not  known  with  certainty.  The  sobriquet  of 
Conselheiro  (the  Councillor)  he  acquired  in  later 
years,  after  he  had  risen  to  fame  in  the  Sertao. 

He  seems  to  have  been  well. educated,  that  is  to  say 
in  relation  to  the  circumstances  in  which  he  was 
brought  up.  Like  many  men  destined  in  after  life 
to  prominence  amongst  their  fellows,  he  was  a  timid 
and  retiring  youth,  averse  from  mixing  with  his  play- 
mates and  with  other  boys.  His  father  employed  him 
as  a  cashier  or  manager  in  his  store  at  Quixeramobim, 
and  he  appears  rarely  to  have  left  the  paternal  home, 
where  he  discharged  his  duties  with  fidelity  and  care. 

The  irascibility  of  his  father  never  seems  to  have 
manifested  itself  in  the  son's  character,  in  his  quiet 
youth,  or  in  the  stirring  scenes  which  he  was  destined 
to  take  part  in  during  his  chequered  life.  On  the 
contrary,  his  temper  seems  to  have  been  quite  im- 
perturbable, steadfast  and  quiet,  with  a  good  share  of 
the  inevitable  obstinacy  with  which  all  martyrs  must 
be  plentifully  endowed. 

Although  he  surely   must    have  heard    his   father 

61 


62  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

talking  with  his  friends  about  the  tragic  history  of  the 
family  a  thousand  times,  Antonio  Macicl  does  not 
appear  to  have  been  affected  in  the  least  by  it,  as 
far  as  it  is  known.  He  bore  the  character  of  a 
retiring  youth,  occupied  solely  with  his  father's 
business  affairs.  His  days  passed  at  the  desk,  and 
nothing  seems  to  have  preoccupied  him,  except  the 
care  of  his  three  sisters,  left,  by  his  father's  death  in 
1855,  entirely  in  his  charge. 

Imagination  pictures  him,  dressed  in  drill  trousers 
and  an  alpaca  coat,  seated  absorbed  with  the  small 
details  of  a  village  store,  his  recreations  a  walk 
round  the  plaza  in  the  evening,  or  a  rare  visit,  on  a 
pacing  mule,  to  a  country  neighbour  a  league  or 
two  away. 

His  real  life  most  certainly  was  of  the  spirit  ;  and 
in  the  little  church,  built  of  adobe,  with  its  little 
bell-cote  over  the  east  door,  no  doubt  he  knelt  for 
hours  in  ecstasy  before  the  "  Bom  Jesus,"  His 
"  Blessed  Mother,"  or  "  San  Antonio,"  that  sainted 
son  of  Portugal.  He  would  be  sure  to  turn  up  at 
any  neighbour's  house  during  "  novenas "  and  sing 
the  hymns  with  fervency,  and  in  his  home  never 
forget  the  rosary  before  he  went  to  bed. 

Life  in  a  small  Brazilian  town  leaves  ample  time 
for  contemplation,  and  no  doubt  when  any  preaching 
friar  came  round  upon  a  mission,  the  quiet  and  retir- 
ing storekeeper  was  at  his  ministrations,  hanging  on 
his  words.  The  town  itself  afforded  but  few  recrea- 
tions, and  they  were  not  the  kind  of  recreation  that 
would  have  attracted  him.  A  cock-fight  on  a  Sunday, 
and  now  and  then  what  was  called  an  "  encamisada,'* 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  63 

when  the  young  men,  mounted  on  their  best  horses, 
fought  a  mock  combat,  with  one  side  dressed  in  white 
to  represent  the  Moors,  a  medieval  custom  brought 
from  Portugal,  were  the  amusements  of  the  place, 
descended  from  old  times.  Sometimes  they  must  have 
ridden  at  the  ring  on  holidays  ;  but  this  was  not  a 
sport  in  which  the  introspective,  self-absorbed  young 
man  would  have  been  likely  to  engage. 

Nothing,  up  to  the  year  1858,  gave  any  sign  that  the 
careful  storekeeper  would  be  called  upon  to  play  the 
part  that  fate  had  destined  for  him  on  his  remote  and 
lonely  stage.  No  doubt  the  blood  of  his  wild  family 
but  slumbered,  and  though  it  never  manifested  itself 
in  the  same  fashion  as  it  did  with  his  uncles  and  his 
grandfather,  the  taint  was  certain  to  appear. 

His  marriage  in  the  year  1858  transformed  him 
utterly.  The  habits  of  a  quiet  life  were  thrown  aside, 
and  he  embarked  on  a  career  of  wandering  and 
change  of  scene  that  in  the  end  made  him  an 
outcast,  and  perhaps  unhinged  his  mind.  His  wife, 
whose  name  history  has  not  preserved,  seems  to 
have  been  utterly  unsuited  to  him.  Of  violent 
temper  and  loose  character,  it  seems  impossible  that 
such  a  sober-minded  youth  could  have  fallen  in  love 
with  her,  except,  perhaps,  in  the  same  way  that  an 
old  maid  is  sometimes  taken  with  a  rake.  Her  very 
difference  from  himself  may  have  attracted  him. 

From  the  first,  his  wife  seems  to  have  indulged  in 
love  affairs.  Time  after  time  he  pardoned  her.  It 
was  no  use,  for,  as  the  Spanish  proverb  has  it,  the 
she  goat  will  be  off  into  the  woods.* 

*  "  La  Cabra  tira  al  monte." 


64  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Whether  to  take  his  wife  away  from  evil  company, 
or  because  of  the  notoriety  attaching  to  her  excursions 
into  the  realms  of  Cytherea,  Antonio  Maciel  left  the 
paternal  store  and  town  in  1859,  and  went  to  a  town 
called  Sobral,  where  once  again  he  found  employment 
as  a  cashier.  There  for  a  time  he  duly  entered  sacks 
of  black  beans  and  mandioca  flour,  tobacco  and  jerked 
beef,  hogsheads  of  sugar  and  of  rum,  with  bits  and 
bridles,  saddles,  powder,  and  all  the  usual  items  of  a 
Brazilian  store,  in  the  ledger,  and  no  doubt  balanced 
his  accounts  to  the  last  copper  fraction  of  a  milrei,* 
or  even  a  testoon. 

He  stayed  but  little  in  Sobral,  and  went  on  to  an- 
other place  called  Campo  Grande.  From  thence  he 
passed  on  to  Ipu,  another  little  town  in  the  Sertao  of 
Ceara.  There  he  acted  as  a  lawyer's  clerk,  but  did 
not  stay  long  in  the  place.  He  had  the  opportunity 
of  entering  into  politics  in  Ipu,  as  his  employers  were 
agents  for  one  of  the  parties  who  aspired,  as  parties 
do  both  in  Brazil  and  in  Great  Britain,  to  be  the 
saviours  of  the  State. 

At  this  time,  however,  Antonio  Maciel,  not  yet 
advanced  to  the  dignity  of  "  Conselheiro,*'  seems  to 
have  been  m^ore  anxious  about  the  welfare  of  his  own 
soul  than  of  the  welfare  of  the  body  politic.  Instant 
in  church  and  at  confession,  beseems  to  have  been  an 
ardent  Catholic. 

*  Milrei,  literally  1,000  reis.  The  coin  equals  a  dollar,  more  or 
less.  The  first  time  that  a  bill  is  handed  you  in  reis,  it  takes  the 
breath  away,  for  it  may  easily  run  to  several  thousands,  and  the 
receiver  of  it  wonders  if  his  bank  account  can  stand  the  strain  of  it. 
It  has  its  compensation  in  the  feeling  of  magnificence  it  superinduces, 
just  as  one  feels  richer  after  reading  of  a  lakh  of  rupees. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  65 

In  Ipu  he  received  the  blow  that  altered  all  his  way 
of  life,  and  in  the  end  led  him  into  the  paths  that 
made  him  celebrated.  His  wife,  who,  as  a  chronicler 
of  his  life  and  miracles  opines,  had  hitherto  been  con- 
tent with  besmirching  his  household  gods,*  now  left 
these  Lares  once  for  all  behind  her  and  went  off  with 
an  officer  of  the  police. 

Antonio  Maciel,  who  was  above  all  things  honest 
and  regular  in  his  life,  was  overwhelmed  with  shame. 
It  may  be  that  the  dishonest  action  of  the  Paphian 
police  official  inspired  him  with  distrust  of  law  and 
order  as  a  whole  ;  but  from  that  time,  at  any  rate,  his 
outlook  on  the  world  was  altered  and  his  whole  life 
was  changed. 

His  first  idea  was  to  hide  his  head  where  he  was 
quite  unknown,  so  he  went  off  to  the  south  of  Ceara. 
There  fate,  in  a  place  called  Paos  Brancos,  threw  him 
in  the  way  of  the  disturber  of  his  household  peace. 
Not  recognising  that  the  seducer  of  his  wife  had  done 
him  a  great  service  in  taking  off  with  him  a  woman 
who,  in  the  speech  of  the  Sertao,  was  common  as  the 
hens,  the  blood  of  his  wild  family  boiled  up  in  his 
veins.  The  careful  store-keeper,  the  approved  com- 
municant, became,  for  the  first  and  last  time  in  his  life, 
a  true  descendant  of  the  fierce  partisans  whose  exploits 
terminated  with  the  grim  death  of  Miguel  Carlos 
Maciel.  Not  able  to  put  his  hand  on  the  seducer,  he 
lay  wait  by  night  for  a  relation  who  had  sheltered 
him,  attacking  him  with  all  the  fury  of  a  jaguar 
robbed  of  its  whelps.  The  victim  of  the  assault,  at 
the  trial  of  Antonio  Maciel,  did  all  he  could  to  save 

*  "  Mancho  seus  Lares,"  Euclydes  da  Cunha  os  Sertaos. 

5 


66  LIFE  AND  xMIRACLES  OF 

him,  alleging  that  the  injured  husband  was  quite 
within  his  rights.  This  sign  of  grace  so  character- 
istic of  a  primitive,  recognised  that  the  motive,  not 
the  mere  action,  is  what  really  matters  in  a  deed  of 
any  kind — at  least  to  theologians — and  in  a  way 
places  the  simple  dwellers  in  the  Sertao  far  above  men 
who  walk  surrounded  by  the  trammels  of  the  town, 
and  can  see  nothing  but  results. 

His  generosity  did  not  save  Antonio  Maciel,  who 
was  consigned  to  prison  on  the  spot.  Prisons  in 
country  districts  of  Brazil,  and  generally  of  South 
America,  are  not  the  places  that  we  know  in  Europe, 
brutally  bare,  silent  and  soul-breaking,  but  partake 
more  of  the  Oriental  pattern,  wherein  the  prisoner 
lies  in  chains  and  filth,  but  can  still  talk  and  see  his 
friends  when  they  appear  to  bring  him  food.  The 
European  prison  kills  the  soul,  the  dungeon  in  the 
East  leaves  the  soul  free,  but  breaks  the  body,  and  so 
mankind  is  justified  of  works. 

Not  seldom,  in  the  Americas,  the  gaol  is  built  of 
sun-baked  bricks,  easily  pierced  through  with  a  knife. 
The  prisoners,  unlike  their  Eastern  colleagues,  are 
seldom  chained  or  bound,  and  thus  escapes  are  frequent, 
and  are  often  looked  upon  as  a  relief  by  those  who 
have  to  guard  the  malefactors.  Antonio  Maciel  was 
not  for  long  an  inmate  of  the  "  calaboose,"*  but  soon 
escaped,  and  after  being  recognised  upon  the  road  to  a 
place  called  Crato,  finally  disappeared,  and  left  no 
trace  of  his  existence  in  the  world  of  the  Sertao. 

Ten  years  had    passed,  and    the  quiet  cashier  and 
outraged  husband  was  as  forgotten  as  if  he  had  been 

*  Calaboufo. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  67 

bound  to  shrivel  up  in  the  dry  soil  of  the  Sertao.  He 
vanished  as  completely  as  a  stone  sinks  out  of  sight  in 
the  pitch  lake  of  Trinidad. 

Nature  in  Brazil  is  so  tremendous,  not  cut  in 
squares  and  utterly  subdued  and  tamed  as  here  in 
Europe  ;  it  is  so  overpowering  in  its  strength  that  it 
reduces  man  to  the  proportions  of  an  ant,  busy,  but 
futile  in  his  enterprises  against  her  immensity.  A  house 
decays  and  falls,  and  in  a  year  or  two  the  house  itself 
and  the  few  cultivated  fields  around  it,  wrung  from  the 
jungle  with  fire  and  axe  and  hoe,  have  disappeared. 
Over  them  waves  a  secondary  jungle,  swallowing 
them  up,  and  in  the  course  of  time  turning  once  more 
to  the  primeval  forest,  as  if  the  force  of  Nature  scorned 
the  puny  efforts  of  mankind. 

When  a  man  dies  he,  too,  is  soon  forgotten.  His 
children  scarce  remember  him,  and  their  children,  if 
they  have  heard  of  him  at  all,  seem  to  regard  him  as 
an  entity  that  lived  a  thousand  years  ago.  Life^, 
Nature  and  the  vastness  of  the  country,  all  give  this  atti- 
tude ;  and  so  Antonio  Maciel  was  quite  forgotten,  and 
the  churches  in  the  little  towns,  where  he  had  prayed 
and  knelt  before  the  images  of  saints  in  ecstasy,  knew 
him  no  more.  Public  opinion  naturally  concerned 
itself  but  little  with  a  man  who  owed  no  lives,*  and 
whose  one  poor  excursion  in  the  footsteps  of  his  clan 
had  proved  infructuous. 

What  he  was  doing,  how  he  lived  during  these  ten 
veiled  years,  that  is  to  us  unknown.  Perhaps,  like 
another  John  the  Baptist,  he  retired  into  the  desert, 
that  forcing  ground  of  saints.      He  may  have  lived 

*  To  owe  a  life  is  to  have  killed  a  man.    The  debt  is  due  to  God. 


68      LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 

amongst  the  Indians.  He  himself  never  once  unlocked 
his  lips  upon  his  wanderings.  Years  afterwards,  when 
he  was  dead  and  gone,  a  faithful  follower,  an  old 
"  Caboclo  "  confessed  to  having  seen  him  at  rare  inter- 
vals wandering  about  and  wrapped  in  silence,  answer- 
ing but  by  a  gesture  or  a  word  to  those  who  spoke  to 
him. 

At  any  rate,  after  ten  years,  he  one  day  reappeared 
in  the  State  of  Bahia,  but  wonderfully  changed.  The 
smug  cashier,  dressed  carefully  in  white  drill  and  clean 
straw  hat,  had  vanished,  and  in  his  place  Antonio 
Maciel  appeared — an  anchorite.  Sunburned  and  worn 
with  fasting,  his  eyes  wide  open,  fixed  and  staring, 
his  sunken  face,  and  his  thin  limbs,  worn  with  priva- 
tion, gave  him  the  look  of  a  monk  from  the  Thebais. 
He  wore  no  hat,  and  his  long  hair  fell  on  his 
shoulders.  His  beard  was  rough  and  spread  out  on 
his  chest,  uncombed  and  biblical.  His  dress  was  a 
long  shirt  of  coarse,  blue  linen,  and  he  leaned  upon 
the  classic  pilgrim's  staff,  knotted  and  gnarled,  but 
shiny  with  long  use. 

Silent  and  unapproachable,  he  must  have  looked  a 
little  like  a  Moorish  saint,  sitting  before  a  Mosque. 
He  was  not  mad,  and  yet  not  altogether  sane,  but 
probably  just  on  that  borderland  in  which  dwell 
saints  and  visionaries,  and  all  those  folk  who  feel  they 
have  a  mission  to  declare,  a  world  to  save,  and  a  vague 
Deity  they  have  to  glorify. 


CHAPTER   III 

In  the  striking  phrase  of  Euclydes  da  Cunha,  his 
chief  biographer,  Antonio  Maciel  had  become  "  an 
old  man  of  thirty."* 

His  life  was  calculated  to  make  him  well  known  to 
all  in  the  Sertao,  where  news  from  the  outside  world 
is  rare,  and  where  men's  interest  concentrates  on  local 
matters  ;  just  as  in  the  East  a  wandering  saint  draws 
more  attention  to  himself  than  the  news  of  some  great 
event  abroad  excites  a  market-place  or  fair. 

All  is  in  the  point  of  view.  To  some,  battles  and 
sieges,  and  to  others  material  progress  by  the  way 
of  aeroplane,  of  submarine  and  telephone,  appear  the 
chiefest  objects  of  man's  contemplation  in  this  transitory 
life.  To  some  it  is  a  matter  of  the  soul,  for  they  per- 
ceive that,  after  all,  material  progress  often  leaves  a 
man  a  mere  barbarian,  self-satisfied  and  dull. 

So  in  the  Sertao  the  fame  of  Antonio  Mendes 
Maciel  grew  and  extended.  His  very  semi-madness 
gave  him  authority,  marking  him  out  as  one  in  closer 
contact  with  the  Deity  than  ordinary  men.  Thus,  m 
the  East,  the  actions  of  a  madman  are  condoned  and 
disappear  in  the  holiness  that  madness  wraps  him  in 
and  separates  him  from  the  mere  rational  crowd  com- 

*  "  Um  velho  de  treinta  annos." 
69 


70  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

petent  to  buy  and  sell,  to  fight,  intrigue,  and  chaffer, 
but  doomed  for  ever,  by  their  very  sanity  itself,  to 
tread  material  ways. 

About  this  time  his  name  was  merged  in  that  of 
Conselheiro,  for  he  advised  the  country  people  as  to 
their  religious  duties,  intervened  in  their  disputes,  and 
thus  became  a  personage  throughout  the  district  and 
far  beyond  its  bounds. 

From  the  Sertao  of  Pernambuco  he  passed  on  to 
Sergipe,  arriving  at  the  town  of  Itabariana  in  the  year 
1874.  There  he  was  quite  unknown  ;  but  the  appari- 
tion in  the  streets  of  the  strange  figure  of  the  hermit 
soon  made  a  deep  impression  on  the  inhabitants. 

Along  the  sandy  streets,  which  as  in  most  Brazilian 
country  towns  are  like  the  beds  of  dried-up  brooks  in 
summer,  torrents  in  winter,  he  wandered  silently.  He 
never  spoke  unless  he  was  addressed,  and  his  appear- 
ance certainly  must  have  been  both  strange  and  strik- 
ing as  he  wandered  up  and  down.  His  long,  blue 
gown,  without  a  belt,  made  him  look  even  thinner 
than  he  was  and  more  emaciated.  His  pilgrim's  hat, 
which  he  wore  generally  hanging  upon  his  shoulders, 
after  the  fashion  of  a  Thessalian  shepherd  in  classic 
times,  his  sandalled  feet,  and  his  wide-open  staring* 
eyes,  gave  him  the  look  as  of  a  mad  Messiah  of  the 
Oriental  type.  In  a  hide  bag  which  dangled  by  his 
side,  he  carried  paper,  ink  and  pens,  a  Missal,  and  a 
Book  of  Hours. -j- 

He  lived  entirely  upon  alms,  rejecting  all  but  just 
sufficient  for  his  daily  sustenance.  Rarely  he  slept 
beneath  a  roof,  but  made  his  bed  upon  a  board  out  in 

*  Olhos  fulgurantes.  t  "  As  Horas  Mariannas." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  71 

the  open  air,  or  on  the  ground  itself.     His  silence, 
his  long  hair  and  beard,  his  abstinence,  and  the  com- 
plete and  absolute  innocence  of  his  life,  soon  made  him 
looked  upon,  if  not  exactly  as  a  saint,  still  as  a  man 
removed  from  sin  and  with  a  mission  to  fulfil.     On 
the  high  pavements  round  the  houses,  at  the  corners 
of  the  streets,  where  in  Brazil  in  country  towns  men 
congregate,  their  horses  tied  to  the  dark,  hard-wood 
posts  set  for  that  purpose  at  almost  every  door,  the 
Sertanejos    lowered    their    voices    when    he    passed, 
muttering,  "  There  goes  the  Councillor." 

In  a  society,  such  as  that  of  the  Sertao  in  the  year 
1874,  where    men    believed    in   the   snake   charmers 
known  as  Mandingueiros,*  in  the  efficacy  of  the  Green 
Beads    ("as   Contas   Verdes ")    brought   from   Africa, 
which  made  the  wearer  of  a  necklace  invulnerable  to 
bullet  and  to  knife,  a  man  such  as  Antonio  Conselheiro 
soon  rose  to  eminence.     Nothing  was  talked  of  but  his 
sanctity.     Legends  began  to  grow  about  the  cures  he 
wrought  in  cases  given  over  by  ordinary  practitioners 
as   quite  desperate.     The  manner  of  his  wandermgs 
was  changed.     No  longer  did  he  stray  about  like  a 
lost  hound  of  heaven,  seeking  for  crusts  at  the  road- 
side.    Followers  had  come  to  him  quite  unsolicited. 
Women   of  course  flocked   to   the   invisible  standard 
that  they  perceived  he  had  unfurled,   as   they   have 
always  flocked  to  any  visionary.     Their  happiness  was 
to  endure  all  that  their  Christ  endured.     To  hve  on 
alms,  to  sleep  out  in  the  open  air,  to  bear  the  whips 

*  The  name  is  taken  from  the  African  tribe  of  the  Mandingos 
In  the  days  of  slavery,  amongst  the  other  slaves,  Ju-ju  and  Gri-L.ri 
men    had^  been  brought  over,  and  these  contmued  their  ntes  and 
superstitions  in  Brazil. 


72  LIFE  AND   MIRACLES   OF 

and  stings  of  fools,  to  have  the  finger  pointed  at  them 
as  in  their  rags  they  passed  along  the  streets,  tickled 
their  vanity,  ministered  to  their  pride  of  faith,  or  really 
aroused  a  spirit  of  devotion  and  self-sacrifice. 

Who  shall  sound  all  the  mysteries  of  the  human 
heart,  or  put  his  finger  on  the  motives  that  influence 
mankind  ?     Humble  in  purple,  swollen  with  pride  in 
rags  ;  puffed  with  good  fortune,  or  steadfast  against  all 
the  whirligigs  of  fate  :   by  turns  a  bar  of  iron  or  a 
weathercock — each  man  is,  has  been,  and  will  ever  be, 
a  mystery  to  his  fellow-slaves  chained  to  this  moving 
sphere.     The  followers  who   flocked  to   Conselheiro 
were  of  the  usual  kind  who  at  first  flock  to  prophets 
when    they    first    begin    to    preach.      Herdsmen    and 
paddlers   of  canoes,  shepherds  and  fishermen,  always 
the  first  to  rally  to  a  Messiah  of  any  kind,  broken  to 
faith  and  patience  as  are  the  followers  of  either  calling, 
formed  his  first   converts  or  his  sectaries.      Outcasts, 
negroes,  those    dwellers  in  the  two-fold  Bohemia  of 
poverty   and    colour,   left   the   begging    bowl    or  the 
scythe  lying  in  the  swathe,  and  swelled  the  rout  of  the 
faithful,  to  which  was  added  a  due  leavening  of  thieves 
and  of  those  men  who  in  wild  regions  such  as  the 
Sertao  begin  their  life  with  a   yoke  of  oxen,  which 
gradually  produce  a  herd.     The  men  who  kill  their 
neighbours'  cattle  under  the  shelter  of  the  darkness,  and 
sell  the  hide  with  the  distinguishing  brand  cut  out, 
came  on  their  thin,   ill-fed,   indomitable  horses,   and 
formed    a    guard   of  rustic  cavalry.     All  these  folk^ 
defeated  in  the  strife  of  life,  were  just  the  kind  of  men 
to  rally  to  a  prophet,  even  though  he  did  not  preach, 
for   at  this   time   there   is   no   evidence  that  Antonio 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  73 

Conselheiro  had  begun  that  series  of  pronouncements 
against  both  the  civil  and  the  religious  government 
v^hich  made  him  famous  and  eventually  cost  him 
his  life. 

In  a  country  such  as  Brazil,  v^here  the  elementary 
necessaries  of  life  are  easily  obtained,  and  in  which 
everybody  in  the  Sertao,  at  least,  lives  upon  horse- 
back, frequently  sleeps  out  in  the  open  air,  and  all  fare 
frugally,  such  an  existence,  intolerable  to  Europeans, 
to  them  was  bearable  enough.  The  prophet  seems  to 
have  had  no  settled  object  in  his  wanderings,  but 
roamed  about  from  town  to  town,  village  to  village, 
and  from  camping  ground  to  camping  ground,  just  as 
the  spirit  moved  him  and  the  whim  of  the  moment 
operated. 

His  following  was  ever  growing.  Vaqueiros,  dressed 
in  leather,  armed  at  all  points  with  blunderbuss  and  a 
sword  stuck  underneath  their  saddle  girth,  the  long 
sharp  "faca  da  ponta,"*  the  "jacare"  or  "  parna- 
hyba  "  in  their  belts,  and  now  and  then  a  pair  of 
rusty  pistols  with  flint-locks,  formed,  as  it  were,  the 
aristocracy  of  the  new  prophet's  following.  The  bulk 
of  it  was  composed  of  half-castes,  mulattoes,  negroes, 
even  *'  Caboclos,"'!'  and  the  strange,  simian-looking 
half-breeds  betwixt  the  Indian  and  the  negro  known 
as  Cafuces  in  Brazil. 

He  neither  asked  for  nor  rejected  followers.  Pros- 
titutes, women  who  had  deserted  husbands  and  chil- 
dren to  follow  after  God,  others  with  little  ones 
following  at  their  heels  as  a  foal  follows  a  brood  mare, 

*  All  these  are  names  for  different  kinds  of  knives, 
t  Tame  Indians. 


74  LIFE  AND   MIRACLES  OF 

even  an  occasional  Tapuya*  who  had  left  the  woods 
at  the  fame  of  Antonio  Conselheiro,  made  up  the 
motley  rout.  Two  of  his  neophytes  carried  with 
them  a  little  altar  made  of  cedar-wood.  In  it  was 
placed  a  rudely  sculptured  Christ,  before  whom  all  the 
faithful  knelt  at  the  crossings  of  the  roads  where  it 
was  hung  upon  a  tree  for  them  to  see  and  to  adore. 

They  threw  themselves  upon  the  ground,  beat  on 
their  breasts,  confessed  their  sins  in  public ;  then, 
pure,  and  relieved  of  the  black  burden  which  the 
accumulated  evil  deeds  of  years  had  made  intolerable, 
resumed  the  tenor  of  their  lives,  and  once  again  began 
to  lay  up  matter  for  a  new  general  confession  and  a  fresh 
start  in  sin.-f-  At  their  approach  to  any  town  or  village 
they  bore  the  altar  at  the  head  of  the  procession,  and 
after  it  followed  the  company,  all  singing  hymns. 

Antonio  Conselheiro  at  this  time  seems  not  to  have 
assumed  the  functions  of  a  leader.  He  merely 
followed  his  ordinary  life,  wandering  about  from  town 
to  town  with  an  ever-growing  multitude  accompany- 
ing his  steps.  In  no  other  country  of  the  world,  out 
of  the  East,  could  such  a  strange  phenomenon  have 
been    observed.     In    North    America,   the    home    of 

*  This  is  the  generic  name  given  to  wild  Indians. 

t  The  portable  altar  was  nothing  new  in  Brazil.  Henry  Koster, 
in  his  excellent  and  interesting  "Travels  in  Brazil"  (London,  1817), 
has  a  curious  description  of  how  certain  priests,  with  a  licence  from 
their  bishop,  used  to  travel  round  the  State  of  Pernambuco  with  a 
little  altar  on  a  pack-saddle,  saying  mass  at  the  different  farmhouses, 
marrying  couples  who  had  not  had  the  opportunity  of  being  legally 
blessed,  and  christening  children.  In  my  youth,  I  remember  the 
periodical  visits  of  a  bishop  in  the  Province  of  Entre  Rios  for  the 
same  purpose.  He  travelled  in  a  carriage,  and  the  more  illiterate 
Gauchos  were  divided  in  opinion  as  to  whether  he  was  the  "  Holy 
Father  "  or  the  "  Eternal  Father  "  himself. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  75 

strange  and  millenary  sects,  even  Joseph  Smith,  the 
Prophet  of  Nauvoo,  had  never  wandered  w^ith  his 
Mormon  followers  about  the  towns  of  the  United 
States.  When  forced  to  leave  Nauvoo,  the  Mormons 
went  off  straight  into  the  desert  to  found  a  Zion  there, 
where  they  could  live  quite  uncontaminated  by  the 
presence  of  the  infidel.  Nothing  was  further  from 
Antonio  Conselheiro's  mind.  If  he  had  wished  to 
shake  the  dust  from  off  his  sandalled  feet  of  the 
comparatively  slight  civilisation  in  which  he  moved, 
nothing  could  have  been  easier.  The  Vaqueiros  only 
had  to  drive  their  cattle  further  west,  and  in  a  week 
at  most  lands  would  have  been  reached  at  least  as 
fertile  as  the  lands  of  the  Sertao.  There  he  could 
have  set  his  Ebenezer  up,  cleared  farms  from  the 
primeval  forest,  and  gone  on  living  undisturbed  by 
Government.  Either  this  never  came  into  his  head, 
or  possibly  he  felt  rather  than  actually  knew  that 
colonies  set  up  beyond  the  frontiers  are  doomed  to 
failure,  or  to  be  absorbed  in  the  waves  of  advancing 
progress,  civilisation,  or  by  whatever  name  you  like 
to  call  the  thing.  Most  probably  he  had  no  fixed  ideas 
at  all  on  any  subject  at  that  time,  and  was  driven  to  act 
as  he  did  subsequently  by  the  force  of  circumstances. 
In  1876  he  entered  the  little  town  of  Itapicuru  de 
Cima  with  all  his  following.  By  this  time  his  fame 
was  growing  and  his  name  was  beginning  to  be  known 
outside  of  the  Sertao.  In  1887  ^  description  of  him  as 
he  appeared  to  ordinary  eyes  was  printed  in  a  journal 
of  Rio  de  Janeiro  called  the  Folhinha  Laemmert. 
"  There  has  appeared "  (the  journal  said)  *'  in  the 
Sertoes    of    the    north    a    man    known    as    Antonio 


76  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES   OF 

Conselheiro,  who  exercises  a  great  influence  upon  the 
people  of  those  parts.  This  is  due  to  his  mysterious 
appearance,  and  ascetic  habits,  by  means  of  which  he 
imposes  on  their  simpHcity  and  ignorance.  His  hair 
and  beard  are  long  and  wild,  he  wears  a  tunic  of 
blue  cotton,  fasts  often  and  so  rigorously  that  he  looks 
like  a  mummy.  Accompanied  by  two  female  disciples 
["  duas  professas  "],  his  life  is  given lup  to  singing  hymns 
and  litanies.  He  preaches  and  gives  advice  to  the 
crowds  that  follow  him,  where  the  parish  priests  allow 
him  to  hold  forth.  .  .  .  He  seems  intelligent,  but  has 
little  education." 

All  this  was  true,  and  it  is  moreover  the  first 
definite  account  that  is  preserved  of  him,  outside  the 
bounds  of  the  Sertao.  Moreover,  it  shows  that  he  had 
advanced  a  step  upon  his  mission,  for,  for  the  first 
time,  there  is  evidence  that  he  had  broken  silence  and 
begun  to  preach  to  his  adepts.  This  was  inevitable. 
A  prophet  who  is  dumb  may  gather  fame,  but 
hardlv  followers.  Not  that  it  is  not  easier  far  to  talk 
than  to  refrain  from  talking,  as  parliaments  can  show, 
where  many  well-reputed  men  have  lost  their  reputa- 
tion by  disregarding  good  occasions  to  keep  silent,  and 
belching  forth  a  speech.  The  little  town  of  Itapicuru 
de  Cima  was  the  turning-point  in  his  career.  Up 
to  that  time  the  loosely  constituted  Government  had 
looked  upon  him  with  indifference.  So  many 
prophets  had  risen  up  in  the  Sertao,  blethered  a  little 
(to  use  a  Scotticism),  and  then  fallen  back  into  their 
well-earned  obscurity,  that  Antonio  Conselheiro  had 
seemed  but  one  of  them — a  star  that,  after  twinkling 
for  a  brief  space,  would  shortly  disappear.  Most 
Governments  work  in  a  mysterious  way,  performing 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  ^j 

such  small  wonders  as  fall  within  their  power,  either 
by  violence  or  fraud.  The  Government  of  the  Sertao, 
which  had  its  seat  in  the  town  of  Bahia,  chose  the  latter 
course,  and  as  Antonio  Conselheiro  was  getting  to  be 
feared,  brought  a  false  charge  against  him.  In  the  same 
year  (i  876-1 877),  to  the  amazement  of  his  followers, 
who  knew  the  innocence  of  his  life  and  customs,  he 
was  arrested  suddenly  and  brought  before  a  judge. 
His  followers  wished  to  defend  him,  for  they  were 
numerous  and  armed.  He  at  once  assumed  the  atti- 
tude from  which  he  never  once  departed  during  the 
remainder  of  his  life,  that  of  a  martyr  and  a  stoic, 
bearing  the  ills  of  life  and  man's  injustice  with  in- 
difference. Bidding  his  followers  to  refrain  from 
violence,  he  gave  himself  up  into  the  hands  of  the 
authorities  without  resistance,  and  quietly  went  down 
with  them  to  Bahia,  to  meet  the  charge  against  him. 

He  had  need  of  all  his  stoicism  on  the  way,  which 
to  the  discredit  of  his  escort  was  a  veritable  Via  Crucis 
to  the  man  already  weakened  by  long  fastings  and  by 
penances.  Although  the  soldiers  beat  him  cruelly 
upon  the  journey,  he  did  not  make  the  least  complaint 
of  them  when  he  arrived  before  his  judge,  wrapping 
himself  in  the  stoicism  of  the  Indian  race  from  which 
no  doubt  he  was  descended  in  a  more  or  less  degree. 

One  thing  alone  disturbed  him.  On  arriving  at 
the  port  where  he  was  to  embark,  he  asked  not  to  be 
exposed  to  public  curiosity,  a  boon  he  was  entitled  to 
by  every  maxim  both  of  humanity  and  of  the  thing 
called  justice,  for  as  yet  he  was  untried. 

Arraigned  before  the  court,  he  had  to  listen  to  an  un- 
just and  monstrous  accusation  trumped  up  to  ruin  him. 
Founded  upon  his  former  troubles  with  his  wife,  he  had 


78      LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 

to  meet  a  charge  of  having  murdered  her  and  at  the 
same  time  killed  his  own  mother  who  was  sleeping  by 
her  side.  It  was  alleged  that,  being  warned,  a  man 
had  been  seen  by  the  neighbours  to  enter  by  a  window 
to  his  wife's  bedroom,  that  he  had  stolen  up  silently 
one  night  and  fired  upon  the  bed  without  first  ascer- 
taining who  was  there,  and  that  the  occupant  had 
proved  to  be  his  mother,  who  for  some  reason  or 
another  was  sleeping  in  the  house. 

This  charge  he  had  no  difficulty  in  meeting,  for 
both  his  mother  and  his  wife  were  living  ;  so  the 
authorities  were  forced  to  set  him  free.  Silently  he 
left  the  court,  and  in  a  month  or  two  he  reappeared 
amongst  his  followers,  who  had  been  waiting  for  him, 
and  now  received  him  in  the  same  spirit  that  a  band 
of  Christians  of  the  early  Church  would  have  received 
one  of  their  leaders  who  had  been  liberated  after  an 
unjust  charge  in  Rome  under  the  Cassars. 

Nothing  was  wanting  but  the  halo  that  persecution 
gives  a  man  ;  thus  the  authorities  by  their  unjust  and 
foolish  conduct  had  changed  the  wandering  ascetic 
into  a  martyr,  and  from  that  time  his  legend  grew, 
and  his  fame  was  assured. 

His  influence  was  doubled,  and  it  was  whispered 
that  he  had  worked  a  miracle  before  his  judges,  and 
left  them  in  the  same  state  as  Pontius  Pilate,  inquiring 
"  What  is  truth  .?" 

He  laid  no  claim  to  supernatural  powers,  nor  yet 
denied  them  ;  but  left  his  followers  to  spread  the  truth 
according  as  they  saw  it,  after  the  fashion  of  a 
judicious  prophet,  or  of  a  man  superior  to  men  and  all 
their  frailties. 


CHAPTER  IV 

His  reappearance  in  the  Sertao  was  the  signal  for  a 
great  outburst  of  rejoicing  amongst  his  followers.  In 
the  town  of  Chorrocho  he  passed  between  a  serried 
rank  of  his  adorers  wild  with  enthusiasm,  but  he 
himself  unmoved,  his  eyes  wide  open,  fixed  on  vacancy. 
His  long,  blue  tunic  gave  him  a  look  of  walking  in  a 
shroud  ;  his  beard,  which  had  grown  almost  to  his 
waist  in  his  confinement,  an  air  as  of  a  saint  in  an  old 
picture. 

The  "  faithful  "  women  pressed  to  kiss  his  hand  and 
clothes,  crossing  themselves  as  if  he  really  had  been 
canonised.  He  took  it  all,  just  as  he  suffered  rain 
and  sun,  hunger  and  blows,  the  unjust  accusations 
and  all  the  other  miseries  of  life,  in  the  same  silence 
which  he  had  maintained  before  the  judge  and  his 
accusers  in  the  court. 

In  Chorrocho  he  lodged,  or  harboured,  under  a  tree 
outside  the  little  town.  A  chapel  built  near  it  still 
marks  his  residence.  The  tree  itself  has  become  sacred, 
its  leaves  a  panacea  for  any  illness  throughout  the 
countryside  and  to  the  pilgrims  who  frequent  the  place. 
From  that  time  (1878)  commenced  the  series  of 
miracles  that  the  inhabitants  of  the  Sertao  attributed 
to     him.     Whether    he    was    a    party    to    them    is 

79 


8o  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

undecided,  for  he  himself  neither  accepted  nor  denied 
the  powers  he  was  reputed  to  possess.  At  any  rate, 
during  the  next  ten  years  he  wandered  up  and  down, 
in  Alagoinhas,  Inhambuhe,  Bom  Conselho,  Cumbe, 
Pombal,  and  Monte  Santo,  all  little  towns  or  villages, 
with  a  following  always  increasing  like  an  avalanche. 

In  all  of  them  he  left  some  traces  of  his  passage, 
here  raising  the  walls  and  gate  of  some  old  cemetery 
which  had  been  left  to  ruin,  and  there  repairing  an 
old  church  or  oratory.  Sometimes,  after  his  sermons, 
which,  report  said,  were  delivered  with  a  fervour  and 
conviction  quite  apostolic  in  their  zeal,  the  rude 
Vaqueiros  would  collect  funds  to  build  a  chapel  or  a 
church.  Most  of  these  still  remain  to  witness  to  his 
fame  and  the  devotion  of  his  followers. 

In  1887  he  appeared  upon  the  coast  at  Villa  do 
Conde  and  was  received  by  a  great  concourse,  for  his 
fame  had  gone  before  him  from  the  woods  of  the 
Sertao.  Into  the  little  coast  town  he  made  his  entry, 
not  now  with  one  poor  little  altar,  but  with  flags  and 
banners,  and  the  population  bearing  the  statues  and 
the  pictures  of  the  saints  taken  out  from  the  parish 
church  to  swell  the  ceremony.  For  several  days  the 
town  was  crowded  as  if  a  fair  were  going  on,  and  the 
despised  and  persecuted  sectary  found  himself  in  the 
position  of  dictator,  having  thrown  all  the  local  magis- 
trates into  the  shade. 

His  followers  built  booths  in  the  central  square,  and 
so  great  was  the  crowd  when  it  was  known  he  was 
about  to  preach,  that  all  the  converging  streets  were 
strictly  barricaded.  A  pulpit  was  erected,  and  accord- 
ing to  eye-witnesses  his  gift  of  speech  was  wonderful 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  8i 

and  its  effect  upon  his  hearers  no  less  wonderful.  His 
style  was  barbarous,  and  his  discourse  full  of  citations 
from  the  "  Horas  Mariannas,"  abstruse  and  intricate,  a 
mixture  of  advice  to  his  followers  with  proverbs  and 
familiar  phrases  mixed  with  bursts  of  eloquence. 

He  spoke  at  length,  with  his  eyes  fixed  upon  the 
ground,  with  little  gesture,  his  discourse  a  monotone, 
quieting  and  provocative  of  sleep.      His  hearers  hung 
their  heads,  with  half-closed  eyes,  just  as  the  horses 
fastened  outside  the  barricades  hung  down  their  heads 
and  dozed.     Then  in  an  instant  the  man  became  trans- 
figured.    He  raised  his  head  and  words  streamed  from 
his  lips,  so  fast  his  hearers  scarce  could  follow  them. 
Prophecies,  denunciations,   vague    threats    and    hmts 
succeeded  one  another,  and  his  black,  sparkling  eyes 
became  so  terrible  that  his  followers  dared  not  look  at 
him,  and  turned  away  their  heads.     A  sob  ran  through 
his  audience  and  a  hysteric  movement,  which  found 
vent  in  broken  phrases  of  "  Jesus,"  *' Ave  Maria,"  and 
"  Viva,  O  Conselheiro  !"  shook  the  assembled  crowd. 
Then  it  was,  a  cynical  eye-witness  has  recorded,  that 
he  performed  his  real  miracle,  to  rise  above  surround- 
ings almost  ridiculous,  and  to  become  inspired.     So 
must    the    Gnostics    and   the    early    Christians    have 
preached  to  their  followers  and  with  the  like  results. 
In  their  case  the  enemy  was  Paganism  and  still  more 
the  differences  between  the  approaching,  but  slightly 
separated  sects,  a  phenomenon  to  be  observed  down  to 
the  present  day,  when  the  friend  who  will  not  go  with 
you  as  far  as  you  are  going  is  a  worse  foe  than  is  the 
common  enemy  of  both. 

In  the  case  of  Antonio  Conselheiro  the  enemy  was 


6 


82  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

the  Church,  fallen,  as  he  saw  her,  from  her  proud 
estate,  and  sore  in  need  of  a  thorough  reformation 
from  within,  of  which  the  prophet  was  to  be  the 
instrument.  Quite  naturally  the  preaching  friars,  of 
whom  a  considerable  store  existed  in  Brazil,  were  all 
his  enemies.  He  poached  upon  their  province,  drew 
from  the  country  people  the  contributions  that  they 
had  looked  upon  as  their  own  privilege,  and  quite 
outdid  them  in  the  sphere  of  preaching  which  they 
considered  their  especial  territory  in  the  religious  field. 
The  doctrines  and  the  morality  that  Antonio  Consel- 
heiro  preached  were  singularly  like  those  enunciated 
by  Montanus  or  by  the  Carpocratians  in  the  second 
century.  Antonio  Conselheiro  enjoined  an  exag- 
gerated chastity,  thundering  against  marriage,  and 
threatening  with  all  the  pains  of  hell  women  who 
adorned  their  persons,  dressed  their  hair  or  made 
themselves  desirable  in  any  way  to  men.  Those  who 
continued  to  wear  combs  had  crowns  of  thorns  put  on 
their  heads  instead,  to  curb  their  vanity.  Beauty  itself 
was  an  anathema  sent  upon  earth  by  Satan  for  the 
undoing  of  mankind.  Antonio  himself  exhibited  an 
affected  horror  of  it.  He  never  looked  a  woman  in 
the  face  when  speaking  to  her,  carrying  his  precautions 
to  the  same  length  even  when  talking  to  the  old 
**  beatas,"*  who,  as  a  contemporary  Brazilian  writer 
says,  were  fitted  more  to  daunt  a  satyr  than  to  excite 
concupiscence  in  any  ordinary  man. 

The  doctrines  that  Antonio  Conselheiro  preached  in 

■^  A  "  beata,"  in  Spanish  and  Portuguese,  infers  a  woman  given  up 
to  religious  ceremonies  and  church-going.  She  is  always  dressed  in 
black  clothes  that  smell  of  incense. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  83 

the  Sertao  had  an  extraordinary  Kkeness  to  those 
advanced  by  several  of  the  Gnostic  sectaries,  the 
same  blind  terror  of  the  power  of  Antichrist,  who 
was  to  reign  on  earth,  turning  all  to  confusion  and 
setting  up  an  empire  of  unreason  and  of  blood — as 
if  it  wanted  any  Antichrist  to  bring  about  such  a 
condition  of  affairs  in  an  unreasonable  world.  The 
faithful  were  enjoined  to  abandon  all  their  possessions 
in  the  face  of  the  impending  final  judgment,  which  was 
awaited  confidently  and  without  escape.  Meanwhile 
they  were  to  give  all  they  had  in  to  the  common 
treasury — for,  by  degrees,  Antonio  Conselheiro,  though 
quite  disinterested,  foresaw  the  time  when  he  would 
have  to  withdraw  himself  and  all  his  followers  into 
some  stronghold,  where  the  world  could  not  defile  nor 
influence  his  flock. 

This  millenarianism,  curiously  enough,  in  the  face 
of  all  his  preaching  chastity  and  the  duty  of  not  con- 
tinuing the  race  by  breeding  sinners  to  be  damned 
eternally,  furthered  the  practice  of  free  love.  It 
mattered  little  what  men  did  as  the  world  was  to  last 
so  short  a  time,  and  thus  salvation  was  assured  by 
faith,  without  the  mere  formality  of  works. 

In  writing  of  the  Gnostics  of  the  second  century, 
Irensus  said  :  "  They  hold  man  shall  not  be  saved  by 
mere  good  works,  but  by  his  spiritual  nature,  which  is 
incapable  of  corruption,  whatever  they  may  do  ;  just 
as  clay  cannot  injure  gold,  so  their  spiritual  nature 
cannot  be  lost  by  any  kind  of  conduct."* 

Most  certainly  the  rude  sectaries  of  the  Sertao  had 

*  Irenasus  L,  III.  fF.  i.     These  doctrines  were  held  also  by  the 
Valentinians  and  Simonians. 


84  LIFE  AND   MIRACLES  OF 

never  reasoned  out  the  matter,  but  merely  followed 
out  the  indication  of  the  natural  theologians  of  every 
race  and  age,  who,  finding  works  a  task  too  onerous 
for  "  their  conversing,"  fly  for  relief  to  faith. 

Antonio  Conselheiro,  though  an  unconscious  Gnos- 
tic, could  have  known  nothing  of  the  Sophia,  or  held 
the   belief  that   the   principle   of   thought   was   male 
and  female  at  the  same  time,  as  did  so  many  of  the 
Gnostic  sects.     Still  less  could   he  have   heard   any- 
thing about  the  Seven  Worlds,  dear  to  so  many  of  the 
primitives  ;  but  all  the  same,  judged  by  his  preaching 
and  the  effect  it  had  upon  his  followers,  he  was  an 
unconscious   Montanist,   or    perhaps    a   Carpocratian, 
preserved  miraculously,  just  as  a  mammoth  is  occa- 
sionally found  preserved  in  ice,  in  the  Siberian  wilds. 
Nature,  it  would  appear,  is  indestructible,  preserving 
prehistoric  forms  and  follies  intact  for  us  to  wonder  at, 
to  imitate  and  copy,  and  to  perpetuate,  so  that  no  form 
of  man's  ineptitude  shall  ever  perish,  or  be  rendered 
unavailable  for  fools  to  promulgate.    Antonio's  precepts 
were  that  his  followers  should  renounce  all  happiness 
here  in  this  transitory  world.     No  doubt  the  "  beatas  " 
and  the  more  spiritual  of  his  followers  attempted  to  act 
up  to  what  he  preached,  but  many  of  the  vagabonds 
who  flocked  to  his  tattered  standard  looked  at  things 
from  another  point  of  view,  giving  themselves  up,  as 
did  the  Carpocratians  of  old,  to  unrestricted  fornication 
("  devant  le  seigneur  ")  and  to  drunkenness. 

All  principles  to  which  men  turn  for  assistance  in 
their  struggle  with  their  lives  seem  greatly  fallacious. 
Faith  often  leads  straight  to  fanaticism,  and  to  a  dis- 
regard of  works,  plunging  its  votaries  into  an  abyss  of 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  85 

self- absorption,  leaving  their  brethren  starving  in  the 
mire  whilst  the  believer  saves  his  miserable  soul. 
Good  works,  pursued  for  their  own  sake  alone,  induce 
arrogance  and  a  self-satisfaction  that  shrivels  up  the 
soul.  Logic  remains  ;  but  then,  again,  the  followers 
of  Antonio  Conselheiro  who  engaged  in  pious  orgies 
were  surely  logical  enough,  for  if  the  world  is  to  end 
directly,  it  is  best  to  get  what  we  can  out  of  it,  whilst 
our  life  still  remains. 

When  faith  and  works,  philosophy,  logic,  and  the 
rest  of  the  panaceas  that  have  been  preached,  accepted, 
and  been  found  wanting  during  the  past  two  thousand 
years  or  so,  have  failed,  all  that  is  left  to  reasonable 
men  is  to  pay  bootmakers'  and  tailors'  bills  with  regu- 
larity, give  alms  to  the  deserving  and  to  the  undeserv- 
ing poor,  and  then  live  humbly  underneath  the  sun, 
taking  example  by  the  other  animals. 

When  the  gift  of  prophecy  has  descended  on  a  man, 
he  can  as  little  hide  its  light  under  a  bushel  as  one  can 
hide  a  cough,  or  love,  or  as  a  minor  poet  can  refrain 
from  troubling  the  public  with  titubating  lines. 

Antonio  Conselheiro  was  no  exception  to  the  rule, 
and  he  announced  several  years  of  misfortune  to  lead 
up  to  the  destruction  of  the  world. 

"In  1896,"  he  said,  "a  multitude  shall  come  up 
from  the  shore  to  the  Sertao.  The  Sertao  shall  then 
become  a  sea-beach  and  the  shore  become  Sertao.  In 
1898  there  shall  be  many  hats  and  a  great  scarcity  of 
heads.  In  1899  the  waters  shall  be  all  changed  to 
blood  and  a  planet  shall  appear  in  the  East  ...  a 
great  fall  of  stars  shall  bring  about  the  destruction  of 
the  world.     In  1900  all  lights  shall  be  extinguished. 


86  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

God  says  in  his  Holy  Gospel  *I  will  have  but  one 
fold  and  one  shepherd  ...  for  I  have  but  a  single 
flock.' " 

These  prophecies,  which  the  declarer  of  them  did 
not  live  long  enough  to  see  confirmed,  were  found 
after  his  death  in  the  mystic  city  of  Canudos  that  he 
founded,  written  on  scraps  of  paper  and  old  pocket- 
books.  They  were  what  may  be  styled  "  terre  a 
terre"  prophecies,  common  to  every  vulgar  self- 
ordained  mystery-monger  the  whole  world  over,  from 
the  first  dawn  of  Christianity. 

Antonio  Conselheiro  sometimes  rose  to  greater 
heights  and  became  interesting  by  the  extravagance  of 
his  beliefs,  and  by  the  fervour  of  his  faith.  One  of 
his  sermons  is  remarkable.  "  In  the  ninth  hour,  resting 
upon  the  Mount  of  Olives,  one  of  His  apostles  asked 
our  Lord  .  .  .  '  Lord,  what  sign  wilt  Thou  give  us,  so 
that  we  may  be  ready  for  the  destruction  of  the  world  ? ' 
He  answered  them  .  .  .  '  Many  signs  in  the  Moon, 
the  Sun,  and  in  the  Stars.  An  angel  shall  appear,  sent 
by  My  Father.  He  shall  preach  at  every  door  and 
shall  establish  cities  in  the  desert,  churches  and 
chapels,  and  shall  give  council  unto  men.'  "  After  the 
fashion  of  the  Gnostics,  he  seems  to  have  considered 
himself  one  with  Christ,  confounding,  as  it  were,  the 
persons,  and  the  essences  of  each,  into  one  body  and 
one  soul.  So  did  the  Gnostic  preachers  of  the  second 
century  in  their  ecstasies.  Montanus  held  that  the 
prophet  is  a  lyre  to  transmit  the  precepts  of  the  Deity. 
Thus  all  his  prophecies  were  delivered  during  ecstasy, 
a  fact  that  the  shrewd  Irensus  was  not  slow  to  seize 
upon.     '*  True   prophets,"   all   the   orthodox  averred, 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  87 

delivered  their  charisma  after  ecstasy.      Therefore  the 
utterances  of  Montanus  were  not  those  of  the  Divinity. 
The  point  is  a  nice  one,  and  would  seem  to  apply 
not  only  to  Montanus,  but  to  Antonio  Conselheiro  ;  his 
unconscious  fellow-theologians  will  perceive  at  once 
that  neither  Montanus  nor  Antonio  Conselheiro  were 
true  ecstatics;  or,  at  least,  their  prophecies  not  having 
been  digested,  as  it  were,  they  were  mere  journalists  of 
prophecy,  writing  of  current  matters  as  do  journalists, 
and  not  as  artists,  after  the  events  had  become  clarified 
by  time.    In  fact,  they  fell  into  the  category  of  parss- 
thetics,  a  trifling  set  of  whom  the  world  has  always 
been  quite  worthy,  just  as  they  were  worthy  of  the 
world. 

This  did  not  hinder  the  followers  both  of  Montanus 
and  of  Antonio  Conselheiro  from  taking  their  utter- 
ances as  the  ipsissima  verba  of  the  Deity,  although 
we  know  that  this  could  not  have  been  the  case. 

Both  prophets  had  one  circumstance  attaching  to 
their  lives,  that  made  their  Ukeness  still  more  striking, 
for  both  of  them  were  joined  by  two  female  adepts 
who  had  left  their  husbands  to  follow  after  truth. 
The  coadjutors  of  Montanus  were  named  Maximilla 
and  Priscilla ;  those  of  Antonio  Conselheiro  have  not 
had  their  names  preserved.  In  neither  case  does  the 
least  breath  of  scandal  tarnish  their  memories. 

Although  Antonio  Conselheiro  held  the  doctrine  of 
faith  in  its  entirety,  his  practice  was  better  than  his 
belief,  and,  in  the  intervals  between  his  sermons  and 
his  prophecies,  he  yet  had  time  for  works.  All  over 
the  Sertao  he  wandered,  with  a  crowd  of  carpenters  and 
masons    following    him,    who    worked    for    nothing. 


88  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

building  and  renovating  churches,  chapels,  and  ceme- 
teries. His  flock  gave  stone  and  wood  and  all  the 
requisites  for  work,  free,  without  charge  of  any  kind, 
hoping  perhaps  to  receive  their  reward  in  heaven,  or, 
perhaps,  from  real  charity  and  kindness,  seeking  no 
payment,  either  in  this  world  or  the  next.  All  the 
time  that  the  work  was  going  on,  those  who  were 
not  employed  in  carrying  wood  or  stones  sang  hymns  ; 
their  leader  sat  on  a  log  of  wood  or  on  the  ground, 
acting  as  overseer. 

A  man  who  saw  him  at  this  date*  (1887)  describes 
him  as  "short,  dark,  and  Indian-looking  (acaboclado), 
with  long  hair  and  beard."  He  says  he  lived  at  that 
time  in  an  unfurnished  house  to  which  the  "  beatas  " 
brought  provisions,  and  waited  on  him.  The  kind  of 
life  he  led  and  the  part  that  he  took  in  spiritual  affairs, 
such  as  baptisms,  feasts,  novenas,  and  the  like,  aroused 
the  jealousy  both  of  the  preaching  friars  and  of  the 
regular  clergy,  who  found  their  reserves  attacked  by 
the  unauthorised  ministrations  of  Antonio  Conselheiro 
and  his  excursions  into  a  field  peculiarly  their  own. 
They  flew  to  arms,  and  looked  at  him,  not  without 
reason,  just  as  a  blackleg  is  regarded  by  a  trade 
unionist.  Already,  in  the  year  1882,  the  Archbishop 
of  Bahia  had  sent  a  circular  throughout  his  diocese  to 
all  the  parish  priests,  in  which  he  said  :  "  It  having 
come  to  my  notice  that  one  Antonio  Conselheiro  has 
begun  preaching  to  the  people,  exhorting  them  to  an 
excessively  rigid  morality,!  thus  troubling  men's  con- 

"^  Lieut.-Colonel  Darval  Vieira  de  Aguiar,  "  Descripcoes  practicas 
da  provincia  da  Bahia." 

t  "  Un  moral  excessiuamente  rigida." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  89 

sciences,  and  weakening  the  authority  of  the  priest- 
hood, we  call  upon  you  to  prohibit  all  your  flock  from 
listening  to  the  preaching  of  this  man."  The  Arch- 
bishop does  not  seem  to  have  been  too  happy  in  the 
composition  of  his  pastoral.  Rigid  morality  was  not 
a  drug  in  the  Sertao,  and  a  mere  layman  might  have 
thought  that  the  best  way  to  combat  such  exhortations 
would  have  been  to  spur  the  priesthood  on  to  a  like 
cause  themselves,  instead  of  silencing  the  interloper. 

All  the  Archbishop's  efforts  were  infructuous.  The 
people  still  flocked  to  the  preaching  of  the  prophet, 
bringing  their  offerings  ;  and  though  there  is  no 
evidence  that  their  morality  was  in  the  least  improved, 
the  churches  all  through  the  district  were  deserted  and 
left  desolate. 

The  terrors  of  the  Church  having  been  of  no  avail, 
the  secular  arm  next  stepped  into  the  breach.  The 
authorities  of  Itapicuru  wrote  (in  the  year  1886)  to 
the  chief  of  police  in  Bahia  to  the  following  effect. 

After  informing  the  head  of  the  police  that  Antonio 
Conselheiro  was  camped  close  to  the  town,  followed 
by  hundreds  of  persons  of  both  sexes,  he  went  on  to 
say :  "The  fanaticism  of  his  followers  knows  no  bounds. 
It  is  certain  that  a  chapel  has  been  built,  a  thing  most 
necessary,  at  the  expense  of  the  town,  but  the 
sacrifice  is  greater  than  the  benefit  received,  for  all 
Antonio  Conselheiro's  followers  flock  to  his  ministra- 
tions, leaving  the  vicar  without  a  congregation  in  his 
church.  .  .  .  The  fanatics  look  up  to  their  leader  as 
if  he  were  a  god  .  .  .  almost  a  living  god.  Often 
more  than  a  thousand  persons  come  to  hear  him 
preach."       In    regions    such    as    the     Sertao,    where 


90  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

distances  are  great  and  roads  are  non-existent,  this  was 
an  enormous  gathering,  for  the  faithful  probably  came 
from  many  miles  away.  The  "  authority"  went  on  to 
say  :  "The  chapel  cost  about  a  hundred  thousand 
reis,  and  all  the  workmen  are  from  Ceara.  These,  as 
his  countrymen,  Antonio  Conselheiro  blindly  protects, 
allowing  them  to  commit  all  sorts  of  disorders,  so  that 
they  go  on  with  their  work.  ...  A  dispute  having 
arisen  between  the  fanatics  and  the  Vicar  of  Inhambupe, 
both  sides  armed  themselves  as  for  a  battle,  and  the 
peaceful  inhabitants  were  terrified  to  see  the  sectaries 
equipped  with  blunderbusses,  swords  and  knives,  and 
making  ready  to  attack." 

The  expected  battle  seems  not  to  have  taken  place. 
Perhaps  the  vicar's  followers  were  as  well  armed  as 
were  the  sectaries  :  for  nothing  further  is  recorded  of 
the  matter  by  the  "  authority  "  of  Itapicuru. 

In  1887  the  Archbishop  of  Bahia  once  more  inter- 
vened, this  time  on  the  petition  of  the  clergy  of  the 
diocese,  who  informed  him  that  the  "  cause  of  our 
holy  faith  is  suffering,  through  the  proceedings  of  one 
Antonio  Maciel,  who  is  trying  to  convince  the  people 
that  he  is  the  Holy  Ghost." 

Either  Antonio  Conselheiro  was  proving  more 
ambitious  in  his  claims,  or,  as  is  probable,  the  clergy 
had  misrepresented  him,  for  he  himself  does  not 
appear  to  have  advanced  pretensions  of  the  kind  or  to 
have  said  that  he  was  other  than  an  ordinary  man  who 
had  a  mission  to  fulfil. 

The  Archbishop  wrote  to  the  Governor  of  the 
province  upon  the  matter,  and  he  wrote  to  a 
minister  of  state,  saying  a  madman  had  arisen  in  the 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  9^ 

Sertao  who  seemed  as  if  he  might  give  trouble,  and 
asked  if  there  was  a  cell   vacant  in  the  "  Hospicio 
de  Alienados  "  at  the  capital,  in  which  the  madman 
could  be   placed.      The   minister   replied  that   there 
was    no    cell    vacant— an    admirable    answer    and    a 
diplomatic,  worthy  of  any  state  department—and  no 
doubt    pigeon-holed    the    correspondence,    after    the 
fashion  of  his  kind.     Nothing  was  done,  and  the  plan 
of  the  Governor  of  Bahia,  who  seems  to  have  been 
the  only  reasonable  man  who  intervened  in  the  mad 
business,   was  forgotten,  and    the    fame    of   Antonio 
Conselheiro   grew    enormously.       Legends    began    to 
cluster  round  about  his  doings,  and  reputable  witnesses 
averred,  as  they  have  continuously  averred  in  the  like 
cases  since  the  world  began,  that  they  had  seen  him 
work  his  miracles. 

In  Bom  Jesus,  when  ten  stout  workmen  were 
endeavouring  to  raise  a  beam,  the  prophet  told  them  to 
desist,  and  pointing  with  his  finger  to  two,  and  those 
not  the  most  robust  of  them,  he  ordered  them  to  litt 
the  burden,  a  task  which  they  accomplished  easily. 
This  was  seen  by  good  Catholics  who  were  certain 
that  they  were  not  deceived.  Thought  transference  is 
a  commonplace  phenomenon  ;  but  transference  of  force 
is  not  so  common,  and  it  is  reassuring  to  reflect  that 
both  the  witnesses  to  it  were  regular  communicants 
and  had  complied  with  all  the  ordinances. 

Another  time  the  prophet  came  to  Monte  Santo  and 
ordained  that  there  should  be  a  great  procession  to 
the  highest  chapel  on  the  hill.  Like  a  long  snake  the 
multitude  wound  its  way  up  the  mountain  upon  the 
path  cut  in  the  solid  rock.       It  stopped  to  pray  at  all 


92  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

the  oratories.  The  heat  was  terrible,  and  many  of 
the  faithful  faltered  and  fell  out  by  the  way.  At  the 
head  of  the  procession  marched  Antonio  Conselheiro, 
silent  and  corpse-like,  his  body  worn  by  penitences, 
and  his  soul  disturbed  by  its  continual  yearnings  for 
union  with  his  God. 

Night  fell  upon  the  multitude  as  they  toiled 
upwards,  and  the  line  of  torches  which  they  held  must 
have  appeared  to  people  in  the  plains  below  like  a 
long  file  of  glow-worms  slowly  advancing  through  the 
gloom.  At  last  they  reached  the  highest  chapel  on 
the  rock.  There  Conselheiro  sat  himself  down  upon  a 
boulder  and  fell  into  an  ecstasy.  Long  did  he  gaze 
upon  the  heavens,  watching  the  stars  as  they  appeared 
like  fire-flies  in  the  deep-blue  of  the  calm,  tropic  night 
above  his  head.  Meantime  the  faithful  waited,  seated 
on  the  rocks,  silent  and  wondering.  Passing  amongst 
the  throng  that  opened  as  he  advanced,  he  went  into 
the  chapel,  his  eyes  bent  down  upon  the  earth. 
Before  the  altar  he  paused,  raised  up  his  head  and 
pointed  with  his  finger  to  the  most  Iljly  Virgin, 
God's  Mother,  who  with  her  baby  in  her  arms  looked 
down  compassionately  upon  the  exhausted  multitude 
who  had  struggled  up  the  stony  Calvary  to  do  her 
honour  and  to  worship  at  her  shrine.  The  crowd 
turned  towards  the  image,  and  lo  !  a  miracle  occurred, 
seen  plainly  by  them  and  manifest  to  everyone  who 
stood  within  the  fane.  Two  tears  of  blood  rolled 
down  the  holy  countenance — tears  of  compassion, 
it  was  said,  for  all  the  sufferings  that  the  crowd 
had  undergone  upon  its  pilgrimage.  Thus  through 
the  Sertao   by  degrees    the    prophet's    fame    became 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  93 

established.  His  miracles  were  well  attested  and 
believed,  though  he  himself  never  put  forth  the  smallest 
claim  to  supernatural  power.  In  all  his  actions  he 
had  taken  care  never  to  infringe  the  law,  although  it 
is  evident  that  by  degrees  tension  between  his  followers 
and  the  authorities  was  gradually  increased.  The 
smallest  spark  sufficed  to  light  the  flame  and  place  the 
prophet  in  opposition  to  the  law,  and  push  him  to 
the  course  which  in  the  end  led  to  his  ruin  and  the 
death  of  all  his  followers. 


CHAPTER   V 

As  by  degrees  the  tension  between  the  authorities  and 
the  followers  of  the  prophet  increased  and  grew  more 
serious,  so  did  he  himself  assume  a  different  air 
towards  the  world.  At  first  he  had  been  content  with 
the  uncomplaining  martyr's  role,  accepting  stripes 
quite  apostolically,  and  all  the  slights  of  jacks-in- 
office,  and  of  fools,  without  a  protest  or  a  word. 
Things  were  to  alter,  and  one  day,  in  a  place  called 
Natuba,  the  vicar  was  amazed  at  the  appearance  of  a 
man,  lean,  lank,  and  worn  with  fasting,  who  asked  for 
shelter  for  the  night.  In  the  Sertao  hospitality  is 
universal,  and  no  one  ever  is  turned  away  from  any- 
body's door  who  asks  for  a  night's  lodging  and  a  bed. 
The  unusual  guest  refused  the  offer  of  a  bed,  prefer- 
ring to  sleep  upon  a  board  on  the  verandah,  dressed  as 
he  was,  without  even  taking  off  the  raw-hide  sandals 
that  he  wore  upon  his  feet.  Next  morning  he  asked 
leave  to  preach  during  a  festival,  for  a  multitude  of 
country  folk  had  come  from  far  and  near  to  attend  the 
ceremony.  The  vicar  answered,  "  Only  a  priest  is  com- 
petent to  preach  on  such  occasions  in  the  church." 
Then  his  guest  demanded  to  be  allowed  to  make  the 
Via  Sacra,  and  this  too  was  refused.  Then,  drawing 
from  his   bag   a  cloth,  he  waved   it   in  the  air,  and 

94 


LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO     95 

taking  off  his  sandals,  shook  the  dust  from  them  before 
the  astonished  priest  ;  then,  looking  at  him  fixedly 
for  a  moment,  he  went  away  without  a  word,  the 
crowd  all  making  way  for  him  as  if  he  were  a  saint. 

Thus  did  he  make  the  apostolic  protest,  and  for  the 
last  time  act  the  part  of  a  submissive  martyr,  content 
to  suffer  all  indignities  and  turn  the  other  cheek. 
From  this  time  he  became  a  different  man,  irascible 
under  the  smallest  contradiction ;  a  dominating  person- 
ality which  had  been  long  kept  under  now  came 
uppermost. 

One  day  he  reappeared  again  in  the  village  of 
Natuba  in  which  the  vicar  had  affronted  him.  The 
church  was  ruinous,  and  as  it  chanced  the  vicar  was 
away  from  home  upon  a  visit  to  his  parishioners. 
Without  a  word,  Antonio  Conselheiro  ordered  his 
followers  to  collect  material  to  put  the  church  in 
order,  and  when  the  astonished  priest  returned,  he 
found  an  enormous  pile  of  stones  ready  for  use  in  front 
of  the  church  door,  and  a  great  crowd  encamped. 
His  fury  knew  no  bounds,  and  he  at  once  placed  an 
embargo  on  the  stones,  saying  that  he  would  use  them 
for  a  road.  This  time  the  prophet  made  no  silent 
protest  ;  but  standing  just  before  the  porch,  with  arm 
outstretched  and  his  eyes  flaming,  launched  a  most 
comprehensive  curse  against  the  vicar,  his  church,  the 
village  and  all  that  dwelt  in  it,  and  then  departed, 
followed  by  the  multitude  formed  in  procession  sing- 
ing a  hymn,  till  they  had  left  the  accursed  spot 
behind. 

So  passed  away  a  year  or  two,  his  power  always  in- 
creasing,   and    his    followers   once    more   numerous. 


96  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Then  came  the  abdication  of  the  Emperor  Don  Pedro 
de  Alcantara,  in  the  year  1893.  This  event  naturally 
changed  the  outlook  of  the  Brazilian  people  upon 
politics  and  life.  It  affected  few  more  intimately  than 
Antonio  Conselheiro,  brought  up  as  he  had  been  in  an 
atmosphere  of  feudalism  and  of  ecclesiasticism.  All 
his  preconceived  notions  of  authority  were  outraged, 
and  his  religious  instincts  received  a  shock  before  the 
liberal  attitude  of  the  republic.  During  Don  Pedro's 
reign,  though  liberal  himself,  things  had  gone  on 
without  much  alteration,  partly  from  lack  of  initiative, 
partly  because  the  central  authority  was  weak,  partly 
from  the  lack  of  roads,  and  the  enormous  size  of  the 
Brazilian  territory. 

Things  natural  in  themselves,  that  the  new  republic 
was  obliged  to  institute,  seemed  daring  innovations  to 
the  folk  in  the  Sertao.  Up  to  that  moment  (1893) 
Antonio  Conselheiro  had  limited  himself  to  a  silent 
but  an  effective  protest  against  thelethargy  of  the  clergy, 
and  their  neglect  to  repair  their  chapels  and  churches 
when  they  fell  into  decay.  From  1893  he  took  his 
stand  as  a  politician,  raising  his  protest  against  the 
Government. 

The  event  took  place  in  a  town  known  as  Bom 
Conselho  that  was  to  bring  him  into  conflict  with  the 
law.  Municipalities  had  been  proclaimed  autonomous, 
that  is  to  say  they  had  the  power  of  raising  local  rates 
legally  vested  in  them  by  a  decree  of  the  new  Govern- 
ment. 

Upon  the  notice-boards  of  Bom  Conselho  one  day 
there  appeared  some  notice  or  another  about  taxation 
or  the  levying  of  rates.     Why,  it  does  not  appear,  for 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  97 

up  to  that  time  Antonio  Conselheiro  had  rendered 
scrupulously  to  Cssar  what  was  due  and  undue  to 
him  ;  he  fell  into  a  fury  at  the  sight  of  the  offending 
notices. 

Calling  the  people  all  together  after  a  fiery  sermon, 
he  had  a  bonfire  lighted,  and  making  as  he  said  him- 
self an  "  auto  da  fe,"  he  burned  the  offending  notice- 
boards  to  the  accompaniment  of  hymns.  He  then 
proclaimed  an  insurrection,  calling  the  republic  the 
spawn  of  Satan,  and  an  attempt  to  paganise  the  land. 
This  done,  he  seems  to  have  realised  the  gravity  of 
his  proceedings,  and,  followed  by  his  flock,  he  took 
the  way  towards  the  north  to  give  a  clearer  field  for 
operations  in  a  country  still  little  settled  and  scantily 
populated.  The  Government  sent  all  the  forces  they 
could  muster  in  the  province  to  capture  him  and  to 
disperse  his  followers,  and  thus  nip  the  insurrection  in 
the  bud  before  it  gathered  strength.  Two  hundred 
soldiers,  ill  armed  and  still  worse  officered,  was  all  that 
they  could  lay  their  hands  upon,  and  out  of  these  only 
some  thirty  regulars  were  properly  equipped.  At  a 
place  called  Massete  they  overtook  the  rebels  in  a  little 
open  plain.  The  thirty  well-armed  soldiers  advanced 
upon  the  crowd,  certain  of  victory.  At  their  first  fire 
dozens  of  sectaries  were  stretched  upon  the  ground. 
Then  their  ranks  opened  and  disclosed  their  rustic 
cavalry.  These  charged  upon  the  soldiers,  firing  their 
blunderbusses ;  then  falling  like  a  thunderbolt  on  them, 
with  their  cattle  goads  and  knives  routed  them  utterly. 
The  colonel  gave  the  signal  for  the  flight,  setting  the 
example  by  galloping  away  without  a  thought  for 
what  might  happen  to  his  men  so  that  he  saved  his  life. 

7 


98  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Many  were  killed  and  the  remainder  saved  them- 
selves by  a  prompt  flight  into  the  woods.  The 
prophet  and  his  followers  gained  the  first  victory  and 
remained  upon  the  field. 

From  this  time  fiDrward  they  either  took  the 
name  of  Jagun9os,*  or  else  it  was  applied  to  them  in 
recognition  of  the  prowess  in  their  first  stricken  field. 
Their  victory  had  the  result  of  bringing  in  new 
followers,  who  flocked  to  the  prophet's  standard  in  such 
numbers  that  a  new  force  of  eighty  soldiers  sent  from 
Bahia  dared  not  attack  them,  and  returned  home 
without  a  fight. 

In  this  they  acted  prudently,  for  in  such  districts  as 
the  Sertao,  bushy  and  broken  up  by  barriers  of  rocks, 
regular  troops  fought  at  a  disadvantage  with  men 
brought  up  to  frontier  warfare  from  their  youth,  and 
all  accustomed  to  bear  arms.  Thus  was  the  die  cast 
between  Antonio  Conselheiro  and  his  proselytes,  and 
the  new  republic.  Though  he  was  a  mere  fanatic  in 
religious  matters  he  was  not  blind  as  to  the  conse- 
quences of  his  rash  action,  even  though  crowned  with 
victory  at  first. 

He  at  once  perceived  that  the  republic  would  send 
larger  forces  to  apprehend  him  and  to  disperse  his 
followers.  Though  his  strength  had  been  increased 
by  his  late  success — the  country-people  flocking  to  him 
from  all  sides,  eager  to  kiss  the  hem  of  his  long  cotton 
robe,  and  hail  him  as  a  Christ — he  saw  he  must  with- 
draw farther  afield  to  some  place  capable  of  making  a 
defence. 

Nobody  better  than  himself  knew  the  recesses  of 

*  Jagungos  almost  equals  "  Bravos."     See  note  in  Introduction. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  99 

the  Sertao.  For  nearly  twenty  years  he  had  traversed 
it  on  foot,  and  there  was  not  a  fastness  with  which  he 
was  not  well  acquainted,  or  a  mountain  path  he  had 
not  trodden  in  his  pilgrimage.  Perhaps,  long  before 
his  final  break  with  the  authorities,  he  had  determined 
where  to  repair  and  build  his  Zion,  when  he  was 
forced  to  flee  farther  into  the  more  thinly  peopled 
portion  of  the  country,  or  perhaps  he  merely  hit  upon 
the  place  in  his  march  towards  the  north.  At  any 
rate,  with  a  vast  multitude  he  set  out,  steadily  north- 
wards, his  following  growing  like  a  snowball  as  he 
proceeded  on  his  way.  At  last,  in  the  autumn  of  the 
year  1893,  he  reached  Canudos,  a  spot  hitherto  un- 
known to  fame.  There  he  determined  to  prepare  a 
place  fit  for  defence  and  build  a  city  far  from  the 
haunts  of  men. 


CHAPTER  VI 

In  1893,  ^fter  a  long  and  painful  journey,  during 
whose  course  the  people  marched  singing  hymns, 
and  with  their  portable  altars  and  rough  images  of 
saints  borne  in  the  van,  the  prophet  reached  his 
goal.  This  was  an  old  fazenda,*  fallen  into  ruins  and 
abandoned  to  decay,  known  as  CanudoSy-f-  a  name  des- 
tined to  be  carried  far  and  wide  through  the  vast  terri- 
tory of  Brazil.  Euclydes  da  Cunha  in  his  '*  Os  Sertoes," 
the  chiei  authority  for  the  events  which  happened 
there  and  for  the  life  and  the  career  of  Antonio 
Conselheiro,  tells  us  that  at  the  time  the  prophet 
reached  it  all  it  consisted  of  was  but  some  twenty 
huts.  An  idle  population,  armed  to  the  teeth,  whose 
chief  occupation  lay  in  drinking  rum  and  smoking 
home-grown  tobacco  in  long  pipes  whose  stems  were 
reeds  cut  on  the  river  bank,  formed  its  inhabitants. 
The  river  was  the  Vasa-Barris,  a  considerable  stream  in 
the  north  of  the  State  of  Bahia,  a  territory  larger  than 
many  a  kingdom  in  the  Old  World.  Throughout  the 
vast  and  turbulent  district,  everyone  went  armed  ;  all 
were  born  horsemen,  every  man  in  a  more  or  less  degree 
a  devout  and  all-believing  Catholic,  and  in  things 
spiritual  the  local  vicar  was  supreme.     Naturally,  he 

*  Fazenda,  cattle  farm,  or  almost  any  country  establishment, 
t  Reeds. 

100 


LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO     loi 

had  scant  influence  upon  men's  actions,  for  they  have 
always  had,  and  possibly  will  ever  have,  a  way  of 
escaping  from  the  thraldom  of  morality  and  faith. 
Men  bow  the  knee  and  huddle  up  the  mind  into 
a  nutshell,  whilst  still  believing  ready  to  persecute  all 
those  who  differ  from  them,  yet  live  like  pagans, 
uninfluenced  by  the  faith  that  they  profess,  still  less  by 
charity. 

So  it  was  with  the  people  of  the  Sertoes.  The 
Vicar  of  Cumbe,  he  whom  Antonio  Conselheiro  pub- 
licly cursed  and  shook  the  dust  off  from  his  sandals  in 
his  face,  has  left  a  record  that  the  inhabitants  of 
Canudos,  at  the  time  when  the  prophet  first  arrived 
there,  were  "  an  idle  folk  and  given  up  to  vice."  Their 
miserable  huts,  cane-built,  and  thatched  with  leaves  of 
cabbage  palm,  looking  like  Indian  wigwams,  or  like 
"  wickey-ups,"  were  scattered  here  and  there  upon 
the  river  banks.  The  fazenda  house  was  all  in  ruins. 
Only  the  church  remained  intact,  and  round  it  was 
grouped  the  greater  portion  of  the  huts.  This  church 
was  destined  to  become,  after  it  had  been  rebuilt,  the 
rallying  point  of  the  Troy  of  the  Jagun9os — to  use 
the  graphic  phrase  of  Euclydes  da  Cunha  in  his 
account  of  it.  The  river  Vasa-Barris  ran,  like  the 
Scamander,  through  a  thick  bed  of  reeds. 

On  every  side  the  landscape  stretched  out  arid  and 
dead-looking,  scorched  by  the  sun  in  summer  and  in 
the  winter  burned  up  by  the  frost.  The  hills  were 
almost  bare  of  vegetation,  and  through  the  scanty  bush 
that  straggled  on  their  sides,  peeped  the  red  earthy 
giving  the  country  a  look  as  if  a  forest  fire  were 
passing  over  it.     In  the  more  fertile  portions  of  the 


I02  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

district  grew  various  Bromelias,  as  the  Caroa,*out  of 
whose  fibres  the  inhabitants  of  the  Sertao  make  ropes 
and  hammocks  and  their  fishing  nets,  the  Ananas  de 
/  Agulhaj-i"  and  the  Caatinga  Branca,.t  whose  hard, 
thorny  leaves  furnish  a  yellow  dye.  Here  and  there 
the  Pereiro  and  the  Ico  flourished  in  spite  of  drought  ; 
curious  little  trees  that  stand  the  heat  and  cold  of  the 
Sertao  better  than  any  others  known,  and,  though 
innocuous  to  the  herds  of  both  wild  cattle  and  of 
horses,  are  said  to  be  a  poison  to  a  horse  heated  with 
travelling  or  to  domesticated§  beasts. 

To  this  deserted  centre,  shut  in  by  mountains  from 
the  world,  Antonio  Conselheiro  evidently  thought  that 
the  accursed  Government  of  the  republic  would  never 
penetrate.  Though  it  was  situated  not  much  more 
than  two  hundred  miles  from  the  town  of  Bahia,  it 
was  cut  off  from  the  outer  world  by  forests,  moun- 
tains, and  by  the  lack  of  roads.  The  only  railway 
finished  at  Queimadas,  seventy  or  eighty  miles  away. 
Between  it  and  the  new  Zion  only  led  cattle  tracks  ; 
in  the  dry  season  waterless,  and  in  the  rains  impassable 
through  mud. 

The  prophet  seems  to  have  had  an  inkling  how 
strong  the  place  was,  and  how  defensible,  or  to  have 
been  advised  by  some  old  soldier  in  his  company. 
From  the  first  moment  of  his  arrival  at  Canudos  he 
displayed  a  feverish  energy.     Men  saw  him  eagerly 

*  Caroa  Bromelia  variegata. 

t  Bromelia  muricata.  %  Linparen  tinctorea, 

§  I  have  been  unable  to  identify  these  trees.  Their  leaves  are  of 
a  very  bright  green  colour,  and  when  all  vegetation  droops  and  the 
leaves  fall  from  the  other  trees,  they  continue  green  and  fresh-looking. 
The  Spondia  tuberosa  has  the  same  drought-resisting  properties. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  103 

surveying  the  best  places  to  dig  trenches,  for  this  was 
his  first  care.  He  preached  incessantly,  foretelling  the 
destruction  of  the  world,  but  letting  it  be  known  that 
those  who  rallied  to  Canudos  would  be  saved  at  the 
last  judgment,  and  their  lives  should  be  prolonged. 
One  who  passed  near  the  newly  founded  town  at  that 
time  left  the  following  testimony  :*  "  Districts  of  the 
surrounding  region  and  even  reaching  out  as  far  as  the 
Sertao  of  Sergipe  were  left  uninhabited,  so  great  was  the 
influx  of  men  and  families  who  flocked  towards  Canu- 
dos, the  place  Antonio  Conselheiro  had  selected  for  his 
operations.  It  made  one  sorry  to  see  the  extraordinary 
quantity  of  cattle,  horses,  goats,  and  other  things,  as 
houses  and  estates  all  sold  for  less  than  nothing,  in 
their  anxiety  to  set  out  on  the  road  and  have  some 
ready  money  in  their  hands  to  help  the  *  holy  Coun- 
cillor '  in  his  mad  enterprise." 

Inhambupe,  Tucano,  Cumbe,  Itapicurii,  Bom  Con- 
selho,  Natuba,  Massacara  and  Monte  Sacro,  with  half 
a  hundred  other  towns  in  Ceara,  in  Pernambuco,  and 
throughout  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  Sertao,  sent 
their  inhabitants.  The  few  rare  travellers  who  ven- 
tured into  regions  so  remote  returned  astonished  at 
the  sights  that  they  had  seen  in  the  deserted  towns. 
These  were  left  tenantless,  with  the  doors  open,  and 
the  wild  animals  which  had  come  out  of  the  woods 
straying  at  pleasure  through  the  streets. 

Over  mountain  trails,  and  labouring  slowly  from 
the  villages  upon  the  coast,  came  long  processions, 
driving  their  flocks  and  herds  in  front  of  them.  In 
their  rude  bullock  carts  were  piled  the  children,  their 

^  The  Baron  de  Geremoabo. 


104  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

altars,  images  of  saints,  and  their  scant  furniture.  They 
wound  along,  toiling  through  forests  and  through 
passes  of  the  hills,  all  singing  hymns,  armed  to  the 
teeth,  and  many  of  them,  riding  the  active  little 
horses  of  the  country,  acting  as  foragers.  When  the 
last  turning  of  the  painful  route  was  past,  and  finally 
the  longed-for  sanctuary  appeared  towards  which  they 
had  converged,  fleeing  the  wrath  so  soon  to  descend 
upon  the  world,  they  fell  upon  their  knees.  Tears 
trickled  down  the  cheeks  of  the  Vaqueiros,  who,  dis- 
mounting from  their  beasts,  threw  themselves  on  the 
ground.  Tired  women  beat  their  breasts  and  children 
whimpered,  the  cattle  lowed,  the  creaking  of  the 
ungreased  wheels  was  stilled,  and  after  prayer  they 
joined  in  singing  hymns  of  joy  and  thankfulness. 
Before  them  lay  the  land  of  promise,  shut  in  by 
mountains  and  cut  off  from  the  world,  but  sanctified 
to  them  by  all  the  sufferings  they  had  undergone  upon 
their  pilgrimage.  Canaan  was  theirs  at  last  after 
their  wandering,  and  they  were  safe  at  least  for  a  brief 
space  before  the  judgment  day.  The  oxen  were  out- 
spanned,  the  flocks  and  horses  driven  off  to  feed,  and 
then  a  ring  of  camp-fires  lighted  on  the  hills  girdled 
the  town  with  flame. 

They  generally  passed  the  night  in  prayer  and  in 
thanksgiving,  and  in  the  morning  started  out  betimes 
to  see  the  "  Councillor."  This  pious  duty  duly  per- 
formed, their  first  care  was  to  set  about  to  run  up 
some  sort  of  dwelling-place.  On  every  side  houses 
were  springing  up  as  if  by  magic — so  rapidly,  they 
seemed  to  rise  out  of  the  ground  like  mushrooms 
after    a   shower  of  rain.     Their  rudimentary  nature 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  105 

allowed  the  builders  to  construct  ten  or  a  dozen  of 
them  every  day.  Each  fanaily  erected  its  dwelling- 
place  exactly  as  it  Uked,  and  where  it  liked,  so  long 
as  there  was  room. 

Nothing  more  monstrous  or  chaotic  was  ever  seen 
than  the  New  Zion,  in  which  each  man  was  a  law  unto 
himself,  except  so  far  as  that  he  paid  in  all  his  funds 
towards  the  common  stock,  and  looked  for  spiritual 
guidance    and    salvation   from   the   impending   doom 
threatening  humanity   to  the   Good  Councillor.      So 
houses  built  of  reeds  sprang  up  without  streets  bemg 
planned,   in   groups,   making  the  most   peculiar  and 
heterogeneous  assemblage  of  human  dwelling-places, 
more  rudimentary  far  than  any  Indian  village  in  the 
woods.     Thus  twisting  lanes  were  formed  with  angles 
sharp  and  easily  defensible,  which  proved  invaluable 
to  the  defenders  of  them   in   the  strife  that  was  to 
come      The  Httle  hill  called  "  A  Favella  "  dominated 
the  only  open  space.    Another,  "  Os  Pellados,"  finished 
on  a  steep  bank  upon  the  River  Vasa-Barris.     Two 
streams,  the  Macuin  and  Umburanas,  ran  through  the 
town   and   were   Unked  up  by   trenches,  which   the 
prophet,  with  a  keen  eye"  to  future  possibilities,  had 
ordered  to  be  dug.     The  houses  of  the  modern  Zion 
were  built  on  an  invariable  plan.    Outside  they  looked 
a  little  like  an   ostrich   nest  or  the  rude  shelters  of 
gorillas,  built  all  of  reeds  and  thatched  with  rushes 
and   with   palm-leaves.     In  taking  little  thought   of 
durability  the  builders  acted  logically  enough.      Who 
would  be  troubled  to  erect  a  Parthenon   (except  an 
artist  for  his  own  satisfaction)  if  it  were  destined  to 
be  overwhelmed  as  soon  as  it  was  built  ? 


io6  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

'*  Inside,  all  of  the  huts  had  three  compartments,  after 
the  fashion  of  the  rude  buildings  of  the  Gauls  in 
Cassar's  "  Commentaries."  First  came  a  little  entrance 
hall,  then  an  atrium  they  used  indifferently  both  as  a 
kitchen  and  a  dining-room.  Lastly  a  low  and  heavy 
door  gave  access  to  the  bedroom,  v^here  slept  the 
women  and  the  children  of  the  family.  In  a  dark 
corner  of  the  mud-daubed  wall  was  set  an  altar,  which 
at  first  sight  was  hardly  visible  amidst  the  smoke  and 
gloom.  About  it  stood  or  hung  some  images  of 
saints  rudely  hewn  out  of  wood,  looking  like  idols  in 
a  Jii-Ju  house  in  Calabar,  or  in  some  village  in  the 
Cameroons.  Figures  of  San  Antonio  like  fetishes, 
and  Blessed  Virgins  so  hideous  that  they  appeared 
like  witches,  kept  guard  upon  the  heathen-looking 
oratory.  Two  or  three  heavy  stools,  a  chest  or  two 
of  cedar-wood,  or  covered  baskets  made  of  rushes,  and 
a  tin  candle  sconce  hanging  from  the  roof  formed  all 
the  furniture.  There  were  no  beds,  nor  any  tables, 
for  they  ate  squatted  on  the  kitchen  floor,  and  slept  in 
hammocks,  or  on  the  ground  upon  their  saddle  gear."* 

A  water  bucket  of  raw  hide,  known  locally  as  a 
Bogo,  with  some  rude  hunting-bags,  hung  from  pegs 
stuck  into  the  mud  walls,  with  lazos,  bridles,  spurs  and 
saddlecloths.  Axes  and  cattle  goads,  with  a  few 
rustic  ploughs  and  mattocks,  stood  in  a  corner  of  the 
hut,  leaning  against  the  wall.  Their  arms  were  all 
the  various  kinds  of  knives  in  use  in  the  Sertao, 
ranging  from  the  short  Faca  de  Ponta  that  they 
carried  in  their  belts,  to  the  long  Parnahyba  stuck 
beneath  their  saddle  girths.  Bayonets  with  wooden 
"^  Euclydes  da  Cunha,  "  Os  Sertoes." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  107 

handles,  kept  in  place  by  a  cow's  tail  put  on  when 
wet  and  left  to  shrink  and  become  hard,  old  swords 
with  wooden  hilts  but  sharp  as  razors,  and  cattle  goads 
shaped  like  an  antique  trident,  were  in  the  hands  of 
all.  Their  firearms  were  at  least  as  various  :  old 
blunderbusses  and  wide-mouthed  pistols,  that  they 
charged  with  anything  they  had,  as  slugs  and  pebbles, 
small  shot  and  bits  of  bone  ;  long-barrelled  fowling 
pieces  ;  and  now  and  then  a  modern  rifle,  bought  in 
Bahia  or  Pernambuco,  formed  their  armoury. 

These  they  kept  all  well  cleaned  and  oiled,  ready 
for  instant  action,  for  they  were  well  aware  their  Zion 
soon  would  be  attacked.  So  closely  did  the  agglomera- 
tion of  reed  huts  assimilate  to  the  prevailing  colour  ot 
the  landscape  that  from  a  little  distance  off  it  was 
invisible,  till  their  great  church  was  built.  Even 
when  it  rose  high  and  Babylonical  above  the  town, 
you  might  have  taken  it  but  for  a  mound  of  earth  or 
natural  eminence  in  the  brown  landscape  that 
surrounded  it. 

This  property  of  invisibility  either  Antonio  Consel- 
heiro  or  his  military  adviser  took  full  advantage  of, 
digging  his  trenches  with  their  parapets  bevelled  down 
towards  the  ground,  so  that  Canudos,  though  fortified 
with  care,  seemed  open  to  attack. 


CHAPTER  VII 

His  trenches  opened,  and  the  ever-increasing  population 
that  had  flowed  into  Canudos  housed,  or  at  least 
sheltered  in  their  huts,  Antonio  Conselheiro's  first  care 
was  to  draw  up  a  scheme  of  life  for  them.  He  was, 
of  course,  supreme,  after  the  fashion  of  all  prophets 
and  democratic  leaders  when  they  have  attained  to 
power.  When  a  man  is  convinced,  as  was  Antonio 
Conselheiro — for  without  doubt  he  was  quite  honest  in 
his  faith  in  himself — that  he  is  God*s  vicegerent  upon 
earth,  nothing  more  natural  than  he  should  make  him- 
self obeyed. 

The  intricate  lanes  formed  by  the  fantastically 
grouped  huts,  the  flanking  hills,  and  above  all  the  strong 
position  on  the  river  bank,  secured  him  from  a  surprise 
attack.  Seen  from  a  little  distance  off,  the  reed-built 
huts  and  the  brown  earth  of  the  embankments 
disappeared  into  the  landscape,  making  the  whole 
almost  invisible,  and  difficult  to  bring  under  artillery 
fire.  The  flocks  and  herds  of  the  community  grazed 
under  an  armed  guard  of  herdsmen  well  to  the  rear  of 
the  position,  upon  the  old  Fazenda  lands.  Water  was 
always  procurable  from  the  various  rivers  that  ran 
close  to  the  town,  and  every  band  of  pilgrims  brought 

io8 


LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO      109 

some  store  of  grain  with  them  which  was  placed  in  the 
common  granary. 

Feeling  himself  secure,  at  least  for  a  considerable 
time,  he  set  about  to  mould  the  lives  of  the  inhabitants 
according  to  his  will.  Conduct  he  left  to  individual 
taste,  setting  but  little  store  upon  it,  as  it  would  seem, 
for  faith  was  his  chief  stronghold,  in  a  world  so  soon 
to  disappear.  Ninety  per  cent,  of  all  their  worldly 
goods  the  faithful  paid  into  the  treasury,  esteeming 
themselves  happy  with  the  little  that  remained  to 
them,  for  mere  material  needs.  *'  Blessed  are  those  who 
suffer  "  was  the  theme  that  he  embroidered  on  in  all  his 
sermons  to  his  followers.  He  enjoined  strict  fasting, 
giving  the  example  in  his  own  person,  and  prolonging 
abstinence  till  he  was  nothing  but  a  skeleton.  Most 
of  the  day  had  to  be  passed  in  singing  hymns  and 
litanies.  Sermons  were  frequent  and  all  the  popula- 
tion had  to  attend  them  under  pain  of  penance  and  of 
punishment. 

Under  this  religious  regimen,  the  simple  Sertanejos 
became  the  fiercest  of  fanatics,  and  well  deserved  the 
title  of  Jagun^os,*  by  which  they  were  beginning  to  be 
known.  All  went  about  armed  to  the  teeth,  ready  to  do 
the  bidding  of  their  prophet  at  the  least  signal  ;  human 
life,  never  too  highly  valued  in  the  Sertao,  became  of 
still  less  value,  though  it  cannot  be  said  that  Antonio 
Conselheiro  in  himself  was  cruel  or  took  delight  in 
blood. 

Like  others  of  the  Gnostics,  he  held  that  virtue  was 
superfluous,    as    the     end    of    the     world     was    fast 
approaching  ;  considering  it  apparently  a  sort  of  vanity, 
■^  See  note  in  Introduction. 


no  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

or,  as  it  were,  an  affectation  of  superiority  over  one's 
fellow-men. 

Anything  that  ennobled  life  here  in  this  transitory 
existence  savoured  of  impiety,  and  as  a  setting  up 
of  oneself  against  the  Deity,  who  had  decreed  the 
destruction  of  the  world.  Marriage  he  set  but  little 
store  by,  as  did  Montanus  in  the  second  century. 
Though  neither  of  them  held  it  was  but  a  mere  licensed 
fornication,  as  did  certain  of  the  Gnostic  sects,  even 
perhaps  TertuUian,  Antonio  Conselheiro  considered  it 
a  counsel  of  perfection,  thinking  perhaps  it  was 
unnecessary  to  beget  children  into  a  world  so  soon  to 
disappear.  Free  love  he  seems  to  have  tolerated,  or 
at  the  least  made  no  inquiry  into  the  conduct  of  his 
followers.  They  upon  their  part  took  full  advantage 
of  his  tolerance,  and  after  passing  all  the  day  either  in 
listening  to  the  prophet's  preaching  or  in  singing 
litanies,  at  night  indulged  in  orgies  of  the  same 
pattern  as  the  "  mystical  communion "  of  the 
Carpocratians,  during  the  Agapes.  The  point,  of 
course,  has  been  debated  since  the  creation  of  the 
world,  and  still  remains  debatable,  as  to  whether  man 
best  fulfils  his  mission  by  living  quietly  under  the  laws 
the  State  sets  down  for  him,  paying  his  debts,  marrying 
but  a  single  wife  at  the  same  time,  and  educating  all 
his  children,  or  by  indulging  in  his  own  desires,  and 
then  washing  his  sins  away  in  a  Niagara  of  tears. 
The  parable  of  the  Prodigal  is,  of  course,  the  strongest 
argument  in  favour  of  the  latter  course,  although  to 
some  minds  repentance  is  a  mean  thing  at  the  best, 
especially  when  it  leads  to  the  penitent  getting  the 
best    of  both    the    lines    of  conduct  that    a    man  is 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  iii 

competent  to  tread.  *'  Repent,  and  sin  no  more  "  is 
a  sort  of  moral  fire  insurance.  No  such  ideas  entered 
the  heads  of  the  Jagun9os  who  sang  their  hymns  with 
fervour,  passed  hours  in  church,  and  fornicated  briskly, 
drinking  as  much  raw  rum  as  they  could  come  by  (for 
there  was  no  fast  on  the  drink),  and  waiting  patiently 
for  the  destruction  of  mankind. 

Antonio  Conselheiro  dwelt  often  in  his  sermons  to 
his  well-armed  saints  upon  the  theme  of  "  Blessed  are 
the  sufferers,"  exhorting  all  his  hearers  to  avoid 
comfort,  good  food  and  clothes  as  they  would  shun  the 
plague.  Better  a  mortal  sin,  he  said,  than  an  excess  of 
comfort,  holding,  as  did  the  monks  of  the  Thebais,  that 
dirt  and  ignorance,  idleness  and  maceration  of  the 
flesh,  were  things  more  acceptable  to  Him  who  at 
the  same  time  had  given  reason  to  mankind  by  which 
to  shape  their  lives. 

So  prophets  from  the  beginning  have  assumed  to 
know  God's  mind  better  than  He  Himself  ;  for  vanity 
and  pride  disguised  in  rags  and  misery  have  been  their 
guiding  stars.  Still,  it  was  evident  Antonio  Consel- 
heiro preached  in  good  faith  and  all  sincerity.  Had 
he  not  done  so,  he  would  have  had  no  followers,  for 
let  the  ecstatic,  mystic,  revolutionary,  or  any  other 
class  of  men  doubt  of  the  leader's  faith,  they  follow 
him  no  more. 

Antonio  Conselheiro  practised  all  he  preached, 
fasting  to  the  point  of  actual  starvation,  sometimes 
remaining  hours  upon  his  knees  in  ecstasy  before  the 
rough-hewn  figures  of  the  saints,  at  others  busying 
himself  with  public  matters — for  he  was  priest  and 
king.       Although     an     almost    absolute    promiscuity 


112  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

reigned  amongst  the  faithful  to  an  incredible  degree, 
no  one  has  ever  brought  a  single  accusation  attaching 
to  his  name  in  matters  sexual. 

His  private  life  was  pure,  his  house  no  better  than 
the  thousand  other  huts  clustering  on  every  side. 

His  food  was  simple,  and  his  dress  always  the 
invariable  tunic  of  blue  cotton,  belted  to  the  waist. 

His  tolerance  or  cynicism — for  in  some  religious 
leaders  it  is  not  easy  to  distinguish  accurately  between 
them — at  least  for  the  lay  mind — was  all-embracing. 
On  one  occasion  a  complaint  was  brought  to  him  that 
a  Jagun9o  in  an  excess  of  pious  fervour  had  seduced  a 
girl  of  tender  years.  He  answered,  "  She  has  but 
followed  the  common  destiny  of  all,  and  passed 
beneath  the  tree  of  good  and  evil  like  the  rest."* 

This  aphorism  must  have  seemed  inspired  to  the 
Jagun90S,  for  it  passed  almost  into  a  proverb  in  the 
Sertao  during  the  prophet's  reign.  Its  ferocious  cyni- 
cism does  not  appear  to  have  occurred  to  them.  The 
phrase,  with  its  flavour  of  the  Scriptures,  no  doubt 
appeared  to  them  dictated  from  on  high.  Thus  did' 
the  prophet  Samuel  hew  Agag  in  pieces  before  the 
Lord,  regardless  of  all  honour  and  all  faith,  and  ride 
off  on  a  phrase.  Each  day  the  prophet  gave  his 
counsels  to  the  faithful,  pointing  out  the  way  that  they 
should  go,  and  now  and  then  performing  miracles. 

One  day  a  follower  wasted  with  fasting  came  to 
visit  him,  and  was  invited  to  sit  down  to  share  his 
frugal  meal.  When  he  departed  he  proclaimed, 
though  he  had  eaten  hardly  anything,  he  felt  as  if  he 

■^  "  Segiuo  o  destine  de  todas,  passou  por  baxio  da  arvore  do  bem  e 
do  mal." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  113 

had  risen  from  a  banquet,  strong  and  refreshed  with 
meat.  The  wondrous  news  ran  through  the  town 
and  all  rejoiced,  both  at  the  miracle  and  because  it  was 
a  sign  the  Lord  had  given  to  their  Councillor. 
Whether  Antonio  Conselheiro  wished  to  bring  the 
people's  bodies  low  by  fasting  and  thus  exalt  their 
minds,  no  one  can  say  ;  but  it  is  certain  that  the  whole 
population  of  Canudos  lived,  as  it  were,  upon  a 
pilgrimage  of  body  and  of  mind.  A  people  in  this 
state  is  moved  more  easily  to  acts  of  heroism  and  of 
self-abnegation  than  those  who  pass  an  ordinary  life, 
marrying  and  giving  in  marriage,  buying  and  selling 
and  setting  down  accounts  by  double  entry.  The 
greater  part  of  the  prophet's  followers  were  simple 
folk,  who  no  doubt  really  thought  the  destruction  of 
the  world  was  close  at  hand,  and  practised  fasting  and 
the  rites  of  their  religion  in  absolute  good  faith. 
Others  arrived,  of  a  far  different  complexion  ;  these  he 
accepted  without  a  question,  holding,  perhaps,  that 
their  adhesion  to  his  cause  wiped  out  their  crimes  ;  or, 
understanding  that  if  the  aim  is  sure,  it  matters  little 
if  the  hand  that  fires  the  gun  be  steeped  in  villainy. 
So,  homicides  and  cattle-stealers,  the  broken  men  of 
the  Sertao,  flocked  to  Canudos,  and  were  received  into 
the  fold. 

Soon  round  him  was  assembled  a  sort  of  Hallelujah- 
band  of  bravos,  much  like  the  Danites  who  surrounded 
Brigham  Young  at  Salt  Lake  City  in  the  first  days  of 
Mormonism.  The  finest  flower  of  all  the  rascaldom 
of  the  Jagun9os  flocked  to  Canudos  to  form  his  body- 
guard.    They  all  held  human  life  at  a  low  price,  for 

they    had    risked    their    own    a    hundred    times    in 

8 


114  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

desperate  enterprises.  All  were  good  horsemen,  able 
with  lazo  and  with  lance,  and  all  were  men  accustomed 
to  the  knife,  for  they  had  used  it  many  a  time  at  fair 
and  pilgrimage.  All  carried  guns  of  varying  patterns, 
and  used  them  handily,  and  not  a  rascal  of  them  all 
but  owed  a  life  or  two. 

Jose  Venancio,  the  terror  of  Volta  Grande,  who  had 
committed  half  a  dozen  homicides,  appeared  one  day 
before  Antonio  Conselheiro,  and,  kneeling  in  the  dust, 
beat  with  his  hands  upon  his  breast,  saying  he  was  a 
miserable  sinner  and  imploring  to  be  saved.  The 
prophet  pardoned  him,  and  took  him  straightway 
into  favour,  without,  as  it  appears,  even  the  vain 
formality  of  telling  him  to  sin  no  more  and  to  live 
virtuously. 

Then  appeared  Pajehu,  a  ruffian  who  had  committed 
innumerable  crimes,  biit  a  born  genius  as  a  bush- 
fighter  and  a  partisan.  Tall  and  well  made,  his  face 
was  flat  and  negro-looking,  his  limbs  athletic,  and  his 
whole  air  that  of  a  murderer  and  an  assassin  steeped  in 
villainy.  The  prophet,  knowing  his  value  as  a  guerilla 
leader,  for  he  had  proved  it  in  a  dozen  skirmishes, 
made  him  his  adjutant.  Lolau,  another  scoundrel  of 
the  same  kidney  and  a  friend  of  Pajehu,  arrived  and 
also  bent  the  knee  before  the  prophet,  holding  his 
rifle  in  his  hand. 

Chiquinho  and  Joao  da  Motta,  brothers  and  high- 
waymen, grovelled  before  the  altar  like  a  pair  of 
"  sacred  wolves."  They  were  named  corporals  of  the 
guard  of  vigilantes,  whose  task  it  was  to  watch  the 
entrance  to  the  town,  just  at  the  junction  of  the  rivers 
Cocorobo  and  Uaui  where  they  fell  into  the  main 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  115 

stream.  Pedro,  a  bestial  Cafuz,*  with  thirty  chosen 
men,  occupied  the  slopes  of  the  little  hill  called  Canna 
Brava.  Estevam,  a  negro,  whose  body,  all  scarred 
over  with  old  knife  and  bullet  wounds,  seemed  to  have 
been  tattooed,  guarded  the  Cumbaio.  Joaquim  Tranca- 
pes-f*  had  the  care  of  Angico,  another  strategic  point. 
"  Major  "  Sariema,  a  man  of  better  education  than  the 
rest,  fearless  and  turbulent,  had  no  particular  charge 
confided  to  him,  but  led  the  wilder  spirits  in  every 
charge  during  the  siege  until  he  met  his  death. 
Raymundo  Bocca-Torta,J  from  Itapicuru,  half  comic 
and  half  tragic  in  his  aspect,  also  arrived  to  lend  his 
look  as  of  a  low  comedian  crossed  with  a  gallows 
bird.  The  fawn-like  Chico  Ema,  afterwards  head 
of  the  scouts,  with  a  guerilla  leader  of  some  repute 
called  Norberto,  joined  the  pious  ranks,  and  fought 
unto  the  death  during  the  last  days  of  the  Zion  they 
had  elected  to  defend.  Quimquim  de  Coiqui,  a  man 
who  had  abjured  all  kinds  of  religion,  felt  his  heart 
touched,  and  once  again  bowed  his  head  reverently, 
and  passed  his  beads  between  his  fingers  as  he  wept 
before  the  cross. 

Antonio  Fogueteiro,  an  ex-lay  preacher,  proved  in- 
defatigable in  making  proselytes.  Jose  Gamo,  a  cattle- 
thief,  and  Fabricio  de  Cocoboco,  who  seems  to  have 
had  no  special  qualifications  except  his  faith,  were 
amongst  the  proselytes. 

Foreign  to  the  general  credulity,  the  asute  Villa 
Nova  offered  his  services,  and  on  his  knees  before  the 

■^  Half-breed,  between  Indian  and  negro, 
t  The  tripper.  Trancar  is  "  to  trip  up." 
X  Wrymouth. 


ii6  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

altar  aped  those  who  prayed  and  beat  upon  their 
breasts,  although  his  thoughts  were  probably  fixed  on 
his  nefarious  schemes.  Old  Macambora,  not  anxious 
for  the  fray,  and  known  as  Soft-Heart/  with  his  son 
Joaquim  rode  up  one  day  and,  getting  off  their  horses, 
threw  themselves  on  the  ground  before  the  prophet, 
and  swore  him  fealty.  Although  "  soft-hearted  "  in 
the  Jagun9o  phrase,  old  Macambora  still  was  danger- 
ous. Famous  in  council,  his  scheming  brain  con- 
ceived the  plans  for  the  most  part  of  the  surprises  and 
the  ambushes  that  cost  the  Government  so  many 
soldiers,  though  he  himself  kept  out  of  danger  and 
never  risked  his  life.  His  son  Joaquim,  though  but  a 
boy  in  years,  perished  heroically. 

Antonio  Beato,  a  lean  mulatto,  rendered  leaner  still 
by  fasting,  furnished  the  comic  element,  and  was,  in 
fact,  one  of  those  semi-madmen  who  appear  in  times 
of  difficulty  and  of  revolt.  Half  soldier  and  half  sac- 
ristan, he  bore  a  missal  in  one  hand  and  in  the  other 
carried  a  blunderbuss.  Antonio  Conselheiro  used  him 
as  a  spy  upon  his  followers,  and  he  transmitted  to  his 
chief  all  that  he  heard  about  town.  No  one  was  safe 
from  the  half-witted  yet  astute  mulatto,  and  as  he 
passed  along  the  street  all  conversations  ceased  till  he 
was  gone. 

One  man  alone  was  innocent  and  pure  in  life  and 
spent  his  time  in  doing  good.  This  was  the 
"  Curandeiro,"'^'  Manoel  Quadrado,  who  looked  at  all 
he  saw  with  the  most  complete  indifference,  passing 
his  time  in  gathering  simples  in  the  woods. 

*  Coragao  MoUe.  t  Hedge  doctor. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  117 

Jose  Felix,  known  as  Taramella,*  with  Antonio 
Beato,  guarded  the  sanctuary,  and  had  the  keys  of  the 
great  trunks  in  which  were  stored  the  miserable  robes 
used  for  processions  and  for  ceremonies. 

Lastly  the  governor  (Chefe  do  Povo),  Joao  Abbade, 
astute  and  dominating,  had  the  charge  of  keeping 
order  amongst  the  civil  population,  a  task  that  he  dis- 
charged with  great  ability,  as  he  understood  his 
countrymen  and  their  mentality.  Surrounded  by  this 
bodyguard  of  scoundrels  and  fanatics,  Antonio  Consel- 
heiro  disposed  of  absolute  authority  over  his  followers. 
This  he  does  not  seem  to  have  abused  or  used  for  his 
own  benefit,  but  turned  it  all  to  his  religious  ends  for 
disciplining  life.  Prayers  grew  and  were  extended 
daily,  and  litanies  lasted  for  hours  ;  but  the  supreme 
and  culminating  moment  was  "  the  kissing  of  the 
saints." 

Slowly  up  the  church  Antonio  Beato  advanced,  with 
the  peculiar  swinging  of  the  haunches  of  the  mulatto, 
holding  a  crucifix.  Upon  the  altar  steps  he  turned 
towards  the  congregation,  with  the  look  of  a  fakir  in 
ecstasy.  Pressing  the  crucifix  close  to  his  breast,  he 
fell  down  prone  upon  the  ground,  kissing  it  fervently. 

He  gave  the  crucifix  to  the  nearest  worshipper,  who 
kissed  and  passed  it  on.  So  round  the  church  it  cir- 
culated, followed  by  the  images  of  saints,  which  all 
devoutly  passed  from  hand  to  hand  amongst  the  faith- 
ful, and  were  devoutly  kissed. 

A  scene  of  ever  rising  religious  erethism  was  the 
result.     Groans,  cries,  and  sobs  broke  from  the  over- 
strained assemblage.     Women  fell  down  and  writhed 
*  The  mill-clapper — i.e.y  chatterer. 


ii8     LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 

upon  the  ground,  exclaiming,  "  Jesus  !  Jesus  !" 
Children  screamed  and  clutched  their  mothers'  shawls. 
The  rude  Vaqueiros  beat  their  breasts,  whilst  the  tears 
trickled  down  their  cheeks.  A  thrill  as  of  religious 
erotomania  shook  every  limb,  distorting  every  coun- 
tenance into  a  sort  of  grin,  half  amorous,  half  demo- 
niacal. Even  the  leaders  yielded  to  it.  The  hideous 
Pajehii  threw  his  arms  round  a  "  sister "  fervently, 
whilst  old  Macamboro  leered  upon  a  maiden  of  fifteen 
with  an  expression  like  a  pious  satyr  "  cut  in  ebony." 
The  others  yelled,  and  brandishing  their  arms,  shouted 
their  war-cries  as  if  they  wished  to  take  heaven  by 
assault,  carrying  their  prophet  with  them  to  establish 
him  on  high. 

Suddenly  all  was  stilled,  as  if  by  magic,  and  every 
eye  was  turned  towards  Antonio  Conselheiro,  who 
stood  beside  a  table  in  the  chancel  beckoning  for 
silence  with  his  hand,  after  the  manner  of  St.  Paul 
upon  the  Areopagus. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

In  a  low  voice,  and  with  his  eyes  fixed  on  the  ground, 
he  began  to  speak  to  the  assembled  multitude,  through 
which  a  sort  of  ripple  ran,  just  as  it  runs  through  a 
calm  sea  after  a  violent  storm. 

The  enormous  half-finished  temple  was  packed  to 
overflowing  with  a  crowd  mostly  composed  of  women 
dressed  in  dirty  white.  Here  and  there  men  and 
youths  were  scattered,  and  in  a  clump  close  to  the 
door  stood  the  redoubtable  guerilla  leaders,  all  armed  to 
the  teeth.  The  temple  still  was  open  to  the  skies, 
crossed  here  and  there  by  beams  which  were  to  hold 
up  the  projected  roof.  The  atmosphere  was  heated 
like  a  stove.  Little  by  little  the  speaker  warmed  up 
to  his  work,  lifted  his  head,  and  broke  out  into  invec- 
tive against  the  republic  and  its  work.  God  had 
forsaken  all  its  agents.  The  impious  ministers  wished 
to  destroy  religion,  and  to  turn  everyone  into  mere 
atheists,  only  fit  for  hell.  If  it  prevailed  the  reign  of 
Antichrist  was  assured.  At  the  mention  of  the  awful 
name  the  audience  broke  out  into  cries  of  "Jesus, 
Jesus  !"  "  Long  live  our  good  Councillor !"  "  Long  live 
God  !"  The  preacher's  eyes  seemed  to  flash  fire.  No 
one  dared  look  him  in  the  face.  The  women  veiled 
their  heads  in  their  dingy  whitish  mantles,  children 

119 


I20  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

cowered  beside  them,  clutching  at  their  hands ;  even 
the  leather-clad  Jagunfos  were  moved,  and  the  tears 
trickled  down  their  cheeks  hardened  by  the  sun  and 
cold.  Only  their  leaders  kept  up  a  semblance  of 
stoicism,  but  raised  their  arms  into  the  air,  brandish- 
ing knives  and  guns.  The  orator  paused  for  a 
moment,  throwing  back  his  fell  of  hair.  The  per- 
spiration poured  down  his  face.  Then  he  struck  into 
a  vein  of  prophecy.  The  reign  of  God  was  nigh.  He 
would  descend  in  majesty  and  might,  confound  His 
enemies,  and  destroy  the  impious  republic  ;  cast  down 
the  mighty  from  their  seats  ;  exalt  the  sufferers,  the 
poor — His  poor — and  burn  up  those  who  had  refused 
to  come  and  listen  to  His  Councillor.  When  the 
demoniac  republic  had  disappeared,  the  King,  Don 
Sebastian,  should  reign  again  for  a  brief  space  in 
glory,  before  the  destruction  of  the  world.  Then, 
little  by  little,  Antonio  Conselheiro  finished  his  dis- 
course, till,  at  the  end  of  it,  he  once  more  stood  with 
his  eves  upon  the  ground,  muttering  half-broken 
phrases,  as  in  an  ecstasy.  When  he  had  ceased,  the 
effect  upon  the  congregation  was  electric.  Groans, 
sighs,  and  broken  exclamations  burst  out,  and  the 
assemblage  seemed  as  if  a  magnetic  current  had  been 
applied  to  it,  for  it  trilled  and  shivered  in  an  orgasm 
of  faith. 

Slowly  it  filed  out  of  the  building  and  dispersed, 
and  soon  Canudos,  exhausted  by  its  faith,  was  silent,  its 
people  sleeping  off  their  debauch. 

Rude  rhymes  celebrated  what  they  had  heard  in 
halting  strophes.  Some  of  them  have  been  preserved, 
such  as  "  Antichrist  was  born  to  govern  poor  Brazil, 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  121 

but  God  raised  up  our  Councillor  to  save  us  from 
that  ill."*  "  Our  King,  Don  Sebastian,  will  come  to 
visit  us,  and  free  us  from  the  reign  of  the  dog/'-f- 
These  rude  effusions  show  the  intellect  and  the  faith 
of  the  prophet's  followers.  He  himself  could  have 
but  a  vague  idea  of  a  republic,  and  as  far  as  can  be 
seen  it  had  not  troubled  him  in  any  way,  whilst  his 
revolt  was  entirely  concerned  with  spiritual  affairs. 
In  reality  the  Sertanejos  cared  no  more  for  the 
Emperor  than  for  the  President,  or  understood  the 
principles  of  either  government.  All  that  they  wanted 
was  to  be  allowed  to  live  their  lives  in  their  own 
fashion,  herding  their  cattle,  listening  to  sermons, 
singing  endless  hymns,  and  deciding  personal  disputes 
with  blunderbuss  or  knife,  after  the  fashion  of  their 
ancestors,  the  Bandeirantes,J  who  had  settled  up 
the  land. 

Antonio  Conselheiro  himself  did  not  so  much  rebel 
against  authority  as  against  life,  perhaps  expecting 
from  it  more  than  it  had  to  give  upon  the  spiritual 
side,  not  understanding  that  a  fine  day,  with  health  to 
enjoy  it,  is  the  most  spiritual  of  the  pleasures  open  to 
mankind.  However,  Antonio  Conselheiro  was  not 
always  in  the  clouds,  or  in  the  pulpit  preaching  to  his 

*  "  O  Anti-Christo  nasceu 
Paro  o  Brazil  governar 
Mas  ahi  esta  O  Conselheiro 
Para  delle  nos  livrar." 

t  "  V  isita  nos  vena  fazer 
Nosso  rei  Don  Sebastiao 
Coitado  daquelle  pobre 
Que  estiver  na  lei  do  cao." 

X  See  Introduction. 


122  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

followers.  Like  other  mystics,  he  had  an  intensely 
practical  side.  He  was  to  be  observed  all  day  super- 
intending those  whose  task  was  to  dig  trenches  and  to 
construct  lines  of  embankments  along  the  river,  behind 
which  riflemen  could  lie.  One  thing  above  all  others 
claimed  his  especial  care.  This  was  to  build  a  temple 
worthy  of  the  place,  large  enough  to  hold  the 
enormous  congregations  that  assembled  in  it,  and  to 
sustain  the  dignity  that  must  attach  to  the  last 
church  built  before  the  destruction  of  the  world. 
The  faithful  gave  their  work  gratuitously.  Material 
was  brought  from  every  district  of  the  Sertao,  and 
piles  of  wood,  of  stone,  and  tiles  were  heaped  on 
every  side  of  the  chief  square.  The  builders  laboured 
with  the  assiduity  of  ants,  possessed,  in  addition  to 
their  instinct,  of  a  religious  fervour  that  drove  them 
to  their  work.  Since  the  building  of  the  pyramids 
mankind  could  not  have  seen  such  crowds  of  unskilled 
labourers  carrying  beams  and  stones  for  their  vast 
enterprise.  The  difference  was  that  in  Canudos  all 
worked  voluntarily,  without  an  overseer  except  their 
Councillor  himself.  Early  and  late  he  was  amongst 
his  labourers,  speaking  to  no  one,  but  seeing  every- 
thing. Nothing  appears  to  have  daunted  him.  The 
frigid  mornings  of  the  Sertao,  with  the  thermometer 
well  below  freezing-point,  found  him  at  daylight, 
bareheaded,  dressed  in  his  cotton  tunic,  labouring  at 
his  post. 

At  noonday,  when  the  fierce  sun,  even  after  frosty 
mornings,  pours  down  like  molten  lead  upon  the 
argillaceous  earth  of  the  barren  hills  around  Canudos, 
he  was  still  upon  his  rounds.      His  workmen  saw  him 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  123 

with  admiration,  mixed  with  fear,  walk  Uke  a  tight- 
rope dancer  or  a  somnambuHst  across  beams  passing 
between  the  walls,  at  a  prodigious  height,   as  little 
moved  as  when  he  walked  upon  the  ground.     Slowly 
the  monstrous  Babylonic  edifice  arose  within  a  mass 
of  rustic  scaffolding  sustained  by  ropes  made  of  raw 
hide,  or  merely  of  lianas  cut  down  from  the  trees. 
Shortly  it  dominated  the  whole  town,  towering  above 
the  humble  parish  church  of  the  Fazenda,  which  it  soon 
dwarfed  and  rendered  insignificant.     Built  solidly  in 
a  rectangular  construction,  giving   it  the   look  of  a 
medieval  or  of  a  prehistoric  fortress  reared  by  some 
Nimrod  to  reach  to  heaven  and  dominate  mankind,  it 
towered  above  the  town.     In  the  dead-looking  land- 
scape, where  few  trees  but  the  Mangabeira*  stand  the 
terrific    and   brusque    alterations  of  the   temperature 
and  still  retain  their  leaves,  the  giant  temple  loomed 
up  menacing  and  brown.     Its  walls  were  brown,  the 
prevailing   colour  of  the  stone  of  the  Sertao.     The 
outspreading  sea  of  huts  was  brown  and  dingy-looking. 
Outside   the  boundaries  and  across   the   River  Vasa- 
Barris  the  low  and  undulating  hills  looked  calcined, 
and  as  barren  as  the  mountains  of  the  moon.     Most 
of    the    workers    wore    the    deerskin    dress     of    the 
Vaqueiros,  and  laboured  in  a  cloud  of  dust  that  dyed 
their  faces  even  a  deeper  brown. 

The  dust  hung  over  everything,  rendering  Canudos 
and  its  rising  temple  almost  invisible  within  its  folds, 
regarded  from  a  little  distance  off.  A  traveller  passing 
on  the  hills  must  have  seen  nothing  but  the  simoon 

*  Ribeirea  sorbilis. 


124  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

raised  by  the  barefooted  workers,  pierced  by  the  high 
walls  of  the  rising  temple,  and  by  the  cries  of  those 
who  laboured  at  the  task,  sheltered  and  cut  off  from 
mankind.  The  temple  of  the  Jagun^o  Zion  was 
never  finished ;  but  still  it  played  its  part  in  the  siege 
that  was  to  come.  Meanwhile,  like  a  second  Birs- 
Nimrod  it  towered  above  the  brown,  low  rancheria* 
of  the  sectaries. 

The  Government,  far  away  in  Rio  de  Janeiro,  was 
no  doubt  but  imperfectly  informed  of  what  was  going 
on  in  the  Sertao.  It  saw  at  first  merely  a  monarchist 
reaction  of  which  Antonio  Conselheiro  was  the 
head.  In  the  chief  newspapers  of  Rio  de  Janeiro 
articles  used  to  appear,  speaking  of  the  Sertao  as 
a  second  La  Vendee,  and  hinting  that  European 
money  was  fomenting  plans  against  "  our  freedom," 
and  endeavouring  "to  plant  once  more  the  iron 
claw  of  the  Imperial  eagle  in  the  heart  of  our  beloved 
native  land."  It  may  be  that  these  articles  were 
directed  at  conspirators  in  the  capital  itself,  after  the 
usual  fashion  of  all  Governments  that  never  like  to 
take  the  straight  road  when  a  crooked  path  can 
possibly  be  found.  They  must  have  known  that  in 
the  Sertao  the  people  really  did  not  care  for  any 
Government,  and  it  was  patent  to  all  Brazil  that  the 
Emperor  Don  Pedro,  a  quiet,  scientific  man,  was  quite 
delighted  to  have  done  with  politics  and  to  retire  into 
his  laboratory.  Before  resorting  to  the  principle  of 
force    by    which    all  Governments    must    ultimately 

*  "  Rancheria "  is  the  word  generally  applied  to  a  collection  of 
Indian  or  negro  huts  throughout  the  Americas.  We  have  no  word 
in  English  for  it,  as  we  have  no  such  assemblages  of  huts. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  125 

stand,  the  central  authority  sent  up  a  missionary  to 
endeavour  to  persuade  the  revolutionaries  to  come 
into  the  fold. 

In  1895,  on  a  May  evening,  there  appeared  upon  one 
of  the  low  hills  that  overlooked  Canudos  a  figure  of  a 
kind  hitherto  not  seen  by  the  inhabitants  since  they 
had  built  their  town.  Frei  Joao  Evangelista  de 
Monte  Marciano  was  the  emissary.  Himself  a  Capu- 
chin and  a  man  of  letters,*  he  was  accompanied  by  two 
companions,  the  Vicar  of  Cumbe,  who  had  already 
quarrelled  with  the  prophet,  and  another  Capuchin, 
Frei  Caetano  de  S.  Leo.  All  three  must  have  been 
men  of  resolution  and  of  courage  to  put  their  heads 
into  the  lion's  den,  unarmed  and  unsustained  by  any 
following. 

Slowly  they  walked  into  the  town,  to  the  amaze- 
ment of  its  inhabitants.  Frei  Monte  Marciano  bore  a 
crucifix,  and  all  the  three  advanced  chanting  a  litany,  a 
sort  of  "  morituri  te  salutemus,"  as  it  were,  before  the 
sacrifice.  In  his  own  *'  Relatorio "  Frei  Monte 
Marciano  tells  us  that  "  the  chief  square  was  packed 
with  people  crowding  one  upon  another,"  that  "  all 
were  armed  to  the  teeth  with  guns  and  knives,  with 
swords  and  iron-tipped  cattle-goads."  All  this  does 
not  appear  to  have  intimidated  him  or  his  companions 
in  their  apostolic  raid. 

They  passed  before  the  ancient  church  of  the 
Fazenda,  now  turned  into  a  chapel,  and  kept  on  upon 
their  way  through  a  dense  multitude.  They 
entered    into    a    dark,    winding    lane    in    which    the 

*  In  his  "  Relatorio  "  he  has  set  down  the  results  of  his  mission, 
and  given  a  most  interesting  account  of  Canudos. 


126  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

inhabitants  all  came  out  to  their  doors  "  with  an 
unquiet  air,  sinister  and  inquiring,  that  spoke  of 
disturbed  consciences  and  hostile  intents,"  as  the  brave 
friar  has  set  down  in  his  "  Relatorio."  The  Vicar  of 
Cumbe  had  an  official  residence  in  the  old  village,  now 
become  a  town.  To  this  the  triad  bent  their  steps, 
and  found  it  shut  up,  falling  into  decay.  Round  it 
were  gathered  groups  of  men,  all  armed,  who  glared 
at  them  without  a  word.  Their  position  was  not 
pleasant,  and  their  disgust  and  apprehension  were 
increased  by  the  sight  of  eight  dead  bodies  borne  to 
the  cemetery  without  the  outward  signs  of  Christian 
burial.  Armed  ruffians  bore  along  the  bodies  at  a 
trot,  wrapped  in  their  hammocks,  as  if,  in  the  striking 
phrase  used  by  Euclydes  da  Cunha  in  describing  it, 
"  a  dead  man  in  that  city  was  a  deserter  from  his 
martyrdom,  fit  to  be  buried  like  a  dog." 

The  news  of  the  arrival  of  the  emissaries  reached 
Antonio  Conselheiro,  at  his  daily  task  of  overseeing. 
He  took  no  notice  of  it,  but  went  on  with  his  work  as 
usual,  and  then,  entering  the  chapel,  fell  to  his  daily 
prayers.  The  missionaries,  thus  rebuffed,  were  forced 
to  go  to  him,  and  turning  back  again  through  the 
dark,  winding  lane  amongst  a  crowd  ever  increasing 
in  hostility,  at  last  they  reached  the  church.  Opening 
the  door,  they  gave  the  usual  salutation,  "  Praised  be 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,"  and  to  their  joy  Antonio 
Conselheiro  advanced  and  answered  them,  "  Let  the 
good  Lord  be  praised  for  ever,"  so  they  knew  that  they 
were  safe. 

Frei  Monte  Marciano  was  much  impressed  by  the 
appearance  of  the  prophet  and  his  "  air  of  penitence." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  127 

"  His  long  and  uncombed  hair  was  beginning  to  turn 
grey  ;  his  face,  worn  with  fasting,  looked  like  that  of 
a  corpse  as  he  advanced  to  meet  us  down  the  church." 
Antonio  Conselheiro  appeared  to  be  pleased  with  the 
visit  of  the  friars,  and  leaning  on  his  pilgrim's  staff,  his 
frail  and  wasted  body  bent  a  little  forward,  he 
welcomed  them  cordially.  For  once  he  appears  to 
have  laid  aside  his  habitual  reserve.  He  told  them 
how  his  work  was  getting  on,  offered  to  show  them 
round  the  church,  and  then,  going  in  front,  acted  as 
guide,  stopping  occasionally  in  an  access  of  coughing, 
which  shook  him  so  terribly  that  Frei  Monte 
Marciano  feared  he  might  expire. 

The  friars  were  astonished,  for  they  had  expected 
quite  another  kind  of  welcome  into  the  lion's  den. 
They  thought  their  victory  was  half  gained  already, 
and  their  spirits  rose,  for  little  did  they  know  that  the 
frail  body  leaning  on  its  staff  contained  an  iron  will. 
This  failure  to  appreciate  the  man  with  whom  they 
had  to  deal  led  them  into  a  fatal  error  that  they  were 
never  able  to  retrieve.  As  they  walked  through  the 
church,  it  gradually  filled  with  curious  onlookers ; 
for  strangers  in  Canudos  were  a  rare  spectacle, 
especially  friars.  When  they  arrived  at  the  choir, 
Frei  Monte  Marciano,  turning  round,  addressed  the 
multitude.  Raising  his  voice  with  confidence,  as  if  he 
had  been  preaching  in  his  own  monastery,  he  launched 
into  one  of  those  well-meaning  but  tactless  harangues 
that  upon  like  occasions  have  so  often  added  fuel  to 
the  fire. 

"  I  take  this  opportunity,"  so  he  said,  "  in  the  name 
of  the  Archbishop,  to  call  upon  you  all  to  disperse  and 


128  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

return  to  your  homes,  for  this  will  be  both  for  your 
own  and  for  the  general  good."  Much  more  he 
said,  all  quite  within  the  bounds  of  common  sense, 
and  applicable  enough  had  he  been  speaking  to 
an  ordinary  crowd.  He  spoke  of  all  the  assembled 
people  were  enduring,  of  the  bodies  hurried  to  the 
grave  without  a  prayer  that  he  had  seen  during  the 
morning,  and  on  the  danger  of  the  gathering  together 
of  such  a  multitude  in  arms. 

His  courage  certainly  was  great,  but  his  discretion 
not  in  proportion  to  it,  for  his  harangue  at  once  stirred 
up  his  auditors  to  fury,  and  they  broke  into  shouts  of 
"Death  to  the  friar!  Long  live  our  Councillor!"  The 
imprudent  friar's  life  hung  by  a  thread,  but  Antonio 
Conselheiro  stilled  the  tumult  with  a  movement  of 
his  hand.  Turning  towards  the  friar,  he  said  :  "  These 
people  that  you  see  in  arms  have  all  assembled 
only  to  guard  me  from  my  foes.  You  may  remember 
a  little  time  ago  at  Massete  the  impious  republic 
wished  to  slay  me,  and  there  was  fighting  and  deaths 
upon  both  sides.  In  the  time  of  the  monarchy  I 
allowed  myself  to  be  apprehended  quietly,  because  I 
recognised  the  Government.  To-day  I  defend  myself, 
for  I  refuse  to  recognise  the  republic,  or  any  of  its 
works." 

This  explanation,  quietly  conveyed  in  a  respectful 
tone,  was  not  sufficient  for  the  Capuchin.  With 
a  zeal  worthy  of  a  martyr,  he  began  to  explain  the 
attitude  of  Rome  towards  all  Governments,  explaining 
that  in  France,  which  for  the  last  twenty  years  had 
been  a  republic,  the  Church  recognised  the  laws. 
He  might  have  said  that  the  Apostle  Paul,  as  far  as 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  129 

we  know,  bowed  to  the  authority  of  Nero,  taking 
apparently  no  heed  of  the  proceedings  in  the  Golden 
House,  the  slaying  of  the  Christians,  or  of  the  burning 
of  the  town.  This,  of  course,  might  have  been,  as  the 
proverb  says,  putting  himself  into  a  shir^  ofeleven  yards 
in  breadth,*  for  certainly  none  of  his  auditory  could 
have  heard  of  Nero,  and  not  too  many  of  St.  Paul. 

"  Even  here  in  Brazil,"  said  the  intrepid  friar,  "  we 
all,  from  the  Archbishop  downwards,  recognise  the 
actual  Government,  and  only  you  and  these,  your 
followers,  refuse.  Your  doctrine  must  be  false  !"  A 
shout  broke  from  the  Jagun^os  assembled  in  the 
church  :  "  No,  your  reverence  it  is  that  has  false 
doctrine  ;  our  Councillor,  the  right." 

A  slow  and  sweeping  gesture  from  the  prophet 
stilled  the  tumult  once  again,  and  he  said  quietly,  *'  I 
will  not  tell  my  followers  to  disarm  themselves,  nor 
yet  disperse  and  return  to  their  homes.  At  the  same 
time  I  will  do  nothing  to  disturb  the  holy  mission  of 
your  reverence." 

Word  had  gone  round  that  the  prophet  was  in 
danger,  and  the  Jagun90s,  to  the  number  of  five 
thousand,  hurried  to  the  square,  their  bandoliers  all 
full  of  cartridges  and  with  their  weapons  in  their 
hands.  Inside,  the  church  was  packed,  and  when  the 
friar  mounted  into  the  pulpit  towards  which  Antonio 
Conselheiro  motioned  him,  with  a  courteous  gesture 
of  the  hand,  he  gazed  upon  a  veritable  sea.  Without 
a  text  he  launched  into  his  discourse.  The  congrega- 
tion every  now  and  then  broke  into  protests  at 
doctrines    differing    so    widely    from     those     their 

^  "  Meterse  en  camisa  de  once  varas." 

9 


130  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Councillor  was  wont  to  preach  to  them.  He  himself, 
standing  by  the  altar,  now  and  then  gravely  bent  his 
head  in  sign  of  approbation  when  the  protests  grew 
more  vehement  and  loud.  Frei  Monte  Marciano 
touched  upon  topics  that  he  thought  would  commend 
themselves  to  his  vast  congregation  ;  fasting,  especially, 
occupied  a  portion  of  the  discourse.  He  said  that 
fasting  was  enjoined,  not  to  destroy  the  bodies  of 
mankind,  but  to  restrain  their  passions,  and  that  a  man 
might  eat  sufficient  meat  to  keep  him  in  good  health 
and  yet  commit  no  sin.  In  fact,  he  preached  a 
sermon  of  the  kind  known  to  Scotch  theologians 
as  Erastian,  a  mere  cold  morality,  very  unsatisfying  to 
the  soul.  When  he  explained  his  theory  of  fasting 
the  Jagun90S  broke  into  a  laugh,  and  one  exclaimed, 
"  That  is  not  fasting,  but  mere  gormandising."  His 
sermon  finished  in  Homeric  laughter  and  in  jeers;  but 
the  friar  still  persisted  for  four  days,  in  spite  of  being 
branded  a  Freemason  and  a  Protestant-Republican. 

He  also  was  accused  of  being  a  mere  emissary  of  the 
Government,  sent  to  distract  the  attention  of  people 
till  the  troops  should  arrive.  The  last  time  that  the 
imprudent  friar  addressed  his  unwilling  hearers  was 
on  homicide.  No  theme  could  have  been  less  accept- 
able to  men  accustomed  from  their  youth  to  violence. 
Their  attitude  became  so  hostile  that  there  was 
nothing  left  him,  if  he  aspired  to  save  his  life,  but 
to  retreat,  and  that  as  speedily  as  he  was  ready  for  the 
road.  His  undaunted  courage  and  his  zeal  were 
wasted — that  is,  if  the  exercise  of  zeal  and  courage  are 
ever  really  wasted — or  exercised  in  vain.  In  the 
material  field,  on  which  alone  the  vulgar  estimate  that 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  131 

most  vulgar  of  results,  success,  he  achieved  little,  fail- 
ing where  men  as  zealous  and  undaunted  as  himself 
have  often  failed  before.  Fifty-five  couples  who  had 
been  living  in  open  scandal  and  in  sin,  to  their  own 
satisfaction,  he  joined  in  wedlock,  blotting  out  the  sin, 
but  not  the  scandal,  as  that  had  passed  into  the  region 
of  things  done,  beyond  the  power  of  mitigation  or 
recall. 

He  and  his  followers  heard  several  hundred  general 
confessions,  which  must  have  been  extended  to  some 
length,  for  there  was  plenty  to  confess. 

Not  much  achieved,  for  all  the  danger  he  had  run ; 
but  then  the  field  was  stony,  as  are  the  pastures  in  the 
uplands  of  Castile,  outside  of  Avila. 

When  they  came  to  a  little  hill,  Frei  Monte 
Marciano  and  his  two  companions  halted  ;  then,  taking 
off  their  sandals,  they  shook  the  dust  from  them 
against  Canudos,  and  after  having  launched  the  curse 
of  Rome  against  the  place  and  its  inhabitants,  they 
bent  their  steps  towards  a  more  favourable  field. 


CHAPTER   IX 

The  mission  having  failed  ignominiously,  there  was 
no  resource  left  to  the  Government  but  an  appeal  to 
arms.  At  that  time  the  central  authority  of  the 
new  republic  was  not  thoroughly  established,  and 
throughout  the  country  various  revolutionary  move- 
ments were  going  on  to  combat  it. 

The  city  of  Len^oes  was  besieged  by  brigands. 
Towards  the  territory  in  which  are  situated  the 
diamond  mines  all  was  confusion,  and  in  Rio  Grande 
do  Sul  military  operations  were  taking  place.  Sit- 
uated as  it  was,  the  Government  found  it  impossible  to 
send  an  expedition  against  Canudos  for  a  considerable 
time.  This  gave  Antonio  Conselheiro  time  to  con- 
solidate his  position  and  to  receive  great  reinforcements 
from  the  surrounding  districts  of  the  Sertao. 

For  at  least  two  hundred  years  the  territory  im- 
mediately to  the  west  of  the  district  of  Canudos  had 
been  a  prey  to  social  turmoil  ;  for  it  was  there, 
attracted  by  the  gold  and  diamond  mines,  that  the 
most  turbulent  elements  of  the  population  of  Brazil 
found  a  congenial  home.  All  those  who  did  not  like  a 
settled  life  of  work  came  to  the  territory,  ostensibly  to 
seek  for  mines,  but  in  reality  to  live  by  rapine  and 
by  crime. 

132 


LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO      133 

There,  the  Jagun9o  was  preceded  by  the  Garimpeiro, 
a  predatory  rascal  who  Hved  by  steahng  cattle  and  by 
pillaging  outlying  farms.      He,  in  his  turn,  was  helped 
by  the  Capungueiro  or  outcast  from  the  towns,  who 
found  the  life  congenial  to  him  and  became  as  savage 
as    the    Indians.     The    territory   between    the    rivers 
Vasa-Barris   and    Sao   Francisco  stretching  north  and 
south,  and  from  Canudos  westward   to  the  Rio  das 
Effoas,*  had  thus  become  a  veritable  no-man's-land. 
In    1804  Caetano   Pinto  de  Miranda  Montenegro,  a 
traveller  who  has  left  much  curious  information  as  to 
his  wanderings  at  that  epoch,  writes  of  it  :  "  Coming 
from  Cuyaba  to  the  Recife,^'  a  journey  of  six  hundred 
and  seventy  leagues  ...   I  formed  the  opinion  that 
in    no    portion    of  the    dominions    of    the    King    of 
Portugal^    is    human    life    less    safe" — this    though 
he  had    traversed    leagues    of   virgin    forest   exposed 
to    the    attacks    of   the    wild    Indians,    and    though 
Cuyaba     itself  was    a    remote    and    frontier    village, 
situated  at  the  extreme  limits  of  the  empire,  and  took 
three    months    to    reach.       A    more    modern    writer, 
Colonel  Durval,  puts  it  on  record  that  "  anyone  who 
has  to  travel  through  the  territory  must  lay  in  a  great 
stock  of  all  provisions  and  be  well  armed,  for  at  that 
price  alone  will  he  achieve  his  journey  in  security." 
The  whole  face  of  the  country  was  undulating,  broken 
by  hills,  cut  here  and  there  with  islands  of  forest  that 
jutted  out  into  the  elevated  plains  called  Taboleiros, 

*  River  of  the  Mares,  probably  so  called  from  the  herds  of  wild 
horses  that  frequented  its  banks  in  old  times. 

t  Recife  =  Pernambuco,  so  called  from  the  great  reef  (recife)  that 
forms  the  harbour. 

X  Brazil  was  then  a  Portuguese  colony. 


134  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

which  were  studded  with  cactus,  dwarf  palms,  and 
scrubby  bush.  In  the  plains  the  grass  was  good,  and 
capable  of  sustaining  considerable  herds  of  cattle — had 
there  been  security  for  property  and  life.  As  it  was, 
these  were  but  scantily  grazed  upon,  and  that  to  a 
considerable  disadvantage,  as  owing  to  the  sparse 
populations,  jaguars  from  the  surrounding  forest  did 
great  damage  to  the  herds. 

Houses  were  rare  and  travellers  infrequent,  and  on 
the  plains  or  in  the  forest  trails  strangers  on  meeting 
manoeuvred,  as  it  were,  for  the  weather  gauge.  They 
shouted  out  their  salutations  from  afar,  each  with  his 
hand  close  to  his  gun,  holding  his  horse  upon  the  bit, 
ready  to  pull  his  head  up  to  receive  a  shot  aimed  at 
the  rider,  or  dash  aside  should  the  stranger  endeavour 
to  close  in.  Men  on  a  journey  in  the  district  kept 
their  eyes  fixed  on  the  horizon  to  discover  dust  rising, 
or  the  smoke  issuing  from  a  burning  house,  or  on  the 
ground  to  mark  the  trail  of  any  passer-by  upon  the 
road.  Strangers  were  enemies,  and  dust,  or  smoke, 
fresh  broken  branches  on  a  bush,  or  grass  just  trodden 
down,  the  flight  of  birds,  or  the  uneasy  movement  of 
the  cattle  on  the  plains,  warned  travellers  to  be  upon 
the  watch. 

The  scattered  towns  were  fallen  into  decay,  although 
recovering  about  the  time  when  the  prophet  founded 
Canudos  ;  but  they  were  many  leagues  apart  from  one 
•another.  The  mining  town  of  Januaria,  in  1879,  was 
conquered  by  a  band  of  Jagun9os  from  a  place  called 
Carinhanha,  who  sacked  it  and  returned  laden  with 
the  spoil.  Pilao  Arcado,  once  flourishing,  but  now 
(19 1 8)  deserted,  suffered  the  same  fate,  after  a  great 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  135 

raid  that  took  place  in  1856.  Xigue-Xigue,  Machubas, 
Monte  Alegre,  and  innumerable  fazendas  were  pillaged 
and  left  desolate  at  a  comparatively  recent  date.  One 
town  alone  had  escaped  amongst  the  general  ruin  of 
the  rest.  This  was  Bom  Jesus  da  Lapa,  the  Mecca 
of  the  Sertanejos,  held  inviolate.  Its  fine  position  on 
a  hill  made  it  remarkable.  Near  it  existed  a  strange 
cave,  whose  stalactites  and  stalagmites  gave  it  the 
appearance  of  a  church  not  made  with  hands,  but 
built  by  Nature  for  the  worship  of  the  great  forces 
that  had  created  it.  Its  long  and  tortuous  passages 
were  full  of  bones  of  ancient  animals,  and  that  no 
circumstance  should  be  wanting  to  contribute  to  its 
sanctity  a  curious  legend  rose. 

There,  it  was  said,  once  lived  a  penitent,  a  man 
who,  having  soiled  his  soul  with  deeds  of  violence, 
had  retired  into  the  desert  to  pass  his  life  in  prayer 
for  the  remission  of  his  sins.  A  jaguar,  attracted  by 
his  sanctity,  kept  him  supplied  with  food.  Thus 
sanctified  by  Nature  and  religion,  the  place  became  a 
goal  of  pilgrimages  for  the  inhabitants  of  all  the 
Sertoes,  from  distant  Piauhy  and  from  Sergipe,  down 
to  the  borders  of  Goyaz. 

Upon  the  walls  of  the  chapel  of  the  sanctuary  were 
hung  numerous  votive  offerings  as  is  customary  in 
sites  of  pilgrimages,  where  legs  and  arms  and  fingers, 
moulded  in  wax,  attest  the  cures  vouchsafed,  or  ships 
are  hung  by  pious  mariners  who  have  escaped  a  storm. 

In  the  chapel  of  the  Bom  Jesus  da  Lapa  were  hung 
up  guns  and  knives.  Bandits  who  entered  fully 
armed  were  awestruck,  and,  bursting  into  tears,  felt 
their  souls  touched  with  ecstasy.     They  thought  upon 


136  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

the  crimes  they  had  committed,  most  Hkely  with  the 
very  arms  they  carried  in  their  hands.  A  loathing 
seized  them,  as  it  so  often  seizes  drunkards  after  a 
debauch.  At  once  they  made  a  resolution  to  sin 
no  more,  and  to  remove  temptation  from  their  hands 
hung  up  their  instruments  of  crime  before  the  Infant 
Jesus  and  fell  upon  the  ground.  No  doubt  they  felt 
relieved  when  they  had  thus  poured  out  their  souls 
and  given  up  their  arms  into  the  keeping  of  the 
sacred  Child,  who  smiled  upon  them  from  the  walls. 
Their  repentance  was  sincere,  as  all  repentances  are 
quite  sincere,  so  far  as  they  are  movements  of  the  grace 
interior.  As  they  passed  out  into  the  sun  they  must 
have  felt  new  men,  chastened  and  lightened  of 
the  burden  of  their  crimes.  Perhaps  they  felt 
pangs  of  regret  at  leaving  the  blunderbuss  upon  whose 
stock  was  cut  in  crosses  the  number  of  the  lives  they 
owed,  just  as  men  always  feel  regret  to  leave  behind 
them  an  old  comrade  or  a  piece  of  well-remembered 
furniture. 

However,  life  in  the  Sertao  had  its  own  complica- 
tions and  its  exigencies.  The  chiefest  is  the  means  of 
self-defence,  for  there,  above  all  places  in  the  world, 
man  is  the  wolf  of  man.  Most  likely  in  a  day  or 
two,  finding  themselves,  as  they  would  say,  "  sem 
sombra,"*  when  deprived  of  arms,  they  took  the  road 
to  the  first  town  and  purchased  better  and  more 
modern  weapons  to  carry  on  the  fight.  Of  the  three 
forces  that  beset  mankind — the  world,  the  devil,  and 
the  flesh — the  world  is  the  most  potent  enemy,  for  it 

*  Literally,  "without  shade,"  the  sun  being  the  enemy  in  lands 
of  sun. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  137 

includes  the  other  two,  and  its  attacks  are  far  more 
subtle  and  far  harder  to  resist. 

As  no  society,  even  in  a  robbers'  cave,  can  live 
without  some  ordinances,  or  at  the  least  some  bye-laws 
for  its  own  protection,  a  curious  custom  had  arisen  in 
this  most  turbulent  of  all  the  districts  of  Brazil.  It 
was  well  recognised  that  farms  and  cattle,  even  towns, 
were  liable  to  be  attacked,  pillaged,  or  carried  off; 
but  by  a  curious  distinction,  with  rare  exceptions, 
individual  property  was  safe.  Thus  a  man,  even  with- 
out arms,  could  traverse  the  wild  district  on  the  banks 
of  the  Rio  das  Egoas  on  his  journey  to  the  coast, 
although  his  saddle-bags  were  full  of  gold-dust  or 
diamonds  from  the  mines.  In  the  same  way  a 
stranger  who  had  no  part  in  any  of  the  factions  that 
abounded  and  made  desolate  the  land  was  equally 
secure.  Sometimes  a  pedlar  leading  a  pack  mule 
would  at  the  crossing  of  some  stream,  or  on  a  lonely 
track  meandering  through  the  impenetrable  woods, 
find  himself  suddenly  confronted  with  a  band  of 
bandits  all  armed  to  the  teeth.  The  chief  would 
usually  approach  him,  as  he  sat  trembling  on  his 
mule,  and  pass  the  time  of  day.  Then  he  would  ask 
him  for  a  handful  of  cigars,  throw  his  leg  over  his 
horse's  neck,  and  sitting  sideways,  light  one  of  them 
with  his  flint  and  steel,  then,  after  handing  out  the 
rest  amongst  his  followers,  turn  to  the  pedlar  and 
bid  him  "  go  with  God,"  and  the  whole  troop  would 
disappear  into  the  woods. 

As  the  news  of  the  building  of  Canudos  slowly 
percolated  through  this  wild  district,  bringing  with  it 
the  tidings  that  not  only  would  the  man  who  joined 


138  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Antonio  Conselheiro  be  in  safety  from  all  pursuit  of 
the  authorities,  but  would  be  preserved  from  the 
destruction  of  mankind  so  soon  to  come  about,  than 
hundreds  of  its  wild  inhabitants  flocked  to  the 
prophet's  side.  Canudos  formed  the  point  of  junction 
for  all  the  roving  bands  of  bandits,  of  cattle  thieves 
and  broken  men,  who  for  years  past  had  infested  all 
the  territory  between  the  River  Sao  Francisco  and  the 
Rio  das  Egoas — in  fact,  from  Piauhy  down  to  the 
province  of  Goyaz. 

These  men,  though  robbers,  and  in  most  cases 
murderers,  were  deeply  tinged  with  religion  (or  super- 
stition), and  the  fame  of  Antonio  Conselheiro's  preach- 
ing, joined  to  his  opposition  to  the  Government,  drew 
them  like  iron  towards  a  magnet,  and  of  course  greatly 
increased  his  power.  After  the  failure  of  the  mission 
of  the  friars,  the  Government  seems  to  have  deter- 
mined on  a  policy  of  inactivity,  hoping  perhaps  that 
when  the  novelty  wore  off  the  movement  soon  would 
disappear.  If  they  had  any  such  design,  it  shows 
their  absolute  misconception  of  the  character  of  the 
inhabitants  of  the  Sertao.  Slow  to  decide,  and  indolent, 
as  was  their  usual  attitude,  no  people  in  the  world 
was  more  determined,  or  less  daunted  by  ill-fortune 
when  once  the  die  was  cast.  Unlike  their  Gaucho 
cousins  on  the  plains  of  Rio  Grande  or  in  the  Argen- 
tine— men  ready  to  revolt  or  follow  any  leader,  turbu- 
lent, but  yet  inconstant,  soon  discouraged,  and  ready 
to  disband  their  forces  and  return  to  their  homes — the 
Sertanejos  were  of  adamant.  Misfortune  only  made 
them  more  determined,  and  they  were  always  most  to 
be  feared  after  a  check  or  a  defeat.     On  such  occa- 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  139 

sions  a  surprise  attack  was  always  to  be  expected  from 
them.  The  rugged  nature  of  their  country,  with  its 
hard  cHmate  and  its  pathless  wilds,  was  greatly  in 
their  favour  for  all  such  enterprises  and  for  ambushes. 
Their  upbringing,  always  at  war  with  Nature,  their 
tinge  of  Indian  blood,  and  their  religious  fervour, 
made  them  an  enemy  never  to  be  despised  by  those 
who  knew  them  best.  This  was  the  error  of  the 
Government,  who  held  them  cheaply  for  their  want 
of  discipline. 

In    1896    the    storm,    which    had    so   long    been 
brewing,  burst  out  with  violence. 


CHAPTER   X 

Just  as  in  greater  States  wars  frequently  break  out 
from  insufficient  or  from  futile  causes,  so  in  the  small 
community  of  the  Sertao  hostilities  between  the 
prophet's  followers  and  the  republic  were  brought 
about  by  a  small  matter,  not  worth  the  sacrifice  of 
life.  No  doubt  the  real  cause  lay  deeper,  as  is  usually 
the  case  in  wars  waged  by  more  formidable  powers. 

Antonio  Conselheiro  had  contracted  in  the  town  of 
Joazeiro,  not  far  off  from  the  River  Sao  Francisco,  for 
a  quantity  of  wood.  The  contract  happened  to  have 
been  made  with  two  town  councillors  or  magistrates. 
When  the  time  expired  some  difficulty  arose  as  to  the 
delivery.  This  was  accentuated  by  the  fact  that  the 
contractor,  a  year  or  two  before,  happening  to  be  at 
that  time  a  judge  in  Bom  Conselho,  had,  after  a  dis- 
pute, been  chased  out  of  the  town  by  the  prophet's 
followers  and  put  in  danger  of  his  life.  Whether  he 
wished  to  avenge  the  insult  or  really  was  unable  to 
implement  his  bargain,  only  himself  could  tell.  At 
any  rate,  the  wood  was  not  forthcoming  at  the 
appointed  time,  and  after  several  unavailing  protests 
Antonio  Conselheiro  prepared  to  attack  the  town  with 
a  strong  party  of  his  followers. 

Times    had    changed    since    he    bowed    his    head 

140 


LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO     141 

beneath  the  insults  of  the  world.  Now  he  stood  forth 
a  leader  and  a  redresser  of  abuses,  little  disposed  to 
sit  down  patiently  under  injustices.  In  1897  ^^^ 
Governor  of  the  State  of  Bahia  wrote  to  the  President 
of  the  Republic  in  the  following  terms  : 

"  I   have   received,"    he   said,  '*  from   Dr.   Arlindo 
Leoni,  Judge  of  the  district  of  Joazeiro,  an  urgent 
telegram  telling  me  that  in  a  day  or  two  his  town  will 
be  attacked  by  Antonio  Conselheiro  and  his  followers, 
and    asking  me  for  help  to  stay  the  panic  and  the 
exodus  already  taking  place.     I  answered  him  that  I 
could  not  send  troops  upon  a  simple  rumour,  and  recom- 
mended him  to  guard  the  approaches  to  the  town,  and 
if  he  saw  the  rebels  really  advance,  send  me  a  telegram  ; 
then  I  would  succour  him  with  a  military  force.   .  .   . 
I  ordered  the  General  in  command  of  the  district  to 
send  a  hundred  men  to  Joazeiro  as  soon  as  he  received 
a  message  from  the  Judge  that  they  were  necessary  to 
repel  attack.     The  Judge  informed  me  that  Antonio 
Conselheiro's  forces  were  about  two  days' journey  from 
the  town,  so  I  have  now  despatched  the  soldiers  under 
Lieutenant   Pires  Feireira   to  join  the  forces  of  the 
town." 

From  such  a  little  matter,  the  mere  refusal  to 
implement  a  contract,  great  events  were  destined  to 
ensue.  For  the  past  quarter  of  a  century,  in  fact  since 
1874,  Antonio  Conselheiro  had  been  known  in  the 
Sertao.  Little  by  little  his  fame  had  increased  in  all 
the  district,  and  the  traces  of  his  passage  were  manifest 
in  every  village  and  each  town.  Here  was  a  chapel, 
there  a  church,  and  farther  on  a  cemetery,  raised  from 
a   state    of  ruin    and   decay,    rebuilt,    or   re-enclosed 


142  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

entirely  by  his  efforts  and  by  the  labour  of  his 
followers. 

Upon  the  whole,  in  the  material  sense,  his  influence 
had  made  for  good;  for  though  he  did  but  little 
towards  establishing  a  reasonable  line  of  conduct,  he 
was  a  rallying-point  for  people  who  felt  themselves 
deserted  absolutely  by  all  the  powers  that  be.  His 
influence  was  great  because  of  the  success  of  his  last  ex- 
ploits. In  1 893,  at  Massete,  he  had  gained  a  victory  in 
the  field,  and  later  on  a  moral  victory,  when  the  troops 
sent  against  him  had  returned  without  a  blow  struck 
or  a  shot  fired,  simply  before  the  terror  of  his  name. 

The  apostolic  mission  of  the  Capuchin  had  been  a 
failure,  and  from  all  sides  recruits  continued  to  arrive. 
Frei  Monte  Marciano  has  left  on  record,  in  his 
"Relatorio,"  that  the  armed  forces  in  Canudos  at  the 
time  of  his  apostolic  visit  numbered  about  "  a  thousand 
men,  all  armed  and  vigorous."  The  town  itself  was 
situated  in  a  position  naturally  strong,  and  above  all 
Antonio  Conselheiro  had  the  advantage  of  public 
sympathy,  for  the  whole  district  deemed  him  a  saviour. 

Against  this  town,  situated  in  such  a  good  position 
for  defence  and  so  well  garrisoned  and  amply  pro- 
visioned, the  Government  sent  only  a  hundred  soldiers 
of  the  line.  These  were  to  join  the  half-armed,  semi- 
disciplined  and  scanty  militia  of  the  town  of  Joazeiro 
— an  inconsiderable  force.  This  was  to  court  defeat. 
So  little  did  the  Government  understand  the  serious- 
ness of  the  campaign  in  front  of  them,  that,  in 
November,  1 896,  General  Federico  Solon,  in  command 
of  the  district,  wrote  to  the  General  saying  he  had 
received  orders  to  march  against  Canudos  with  a  force 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  143 

of  about  one  hundred  soldiers,  and  judged  them  amply- 
numerous  enough  for  what  he  had  to  do.  On  the 
7th  of  November  they  arrived  in  Joazeiro,  to  the 
astonishment  of  the  inhabitants,  who  knew  the  strength 
of  the  Jagun9os  advancing  to  attack.  At  once  there 
was  a  general  exodus,  families  fleeing  with  their 
children  and  such  portion  of  their  household  goods  as 
could  be  carried  upon  carts.  As  always  happens  in 
such  circumstances,  the  town  was  full  of  people  well 
disposed  towards  the  sectaries.  All  these  were  over- 
joyed, and  secretly  sent  out  messengers  to  the  Jagun9os, 
telling  them  the  small  number  of  the  troops. 

The  difficulties  of  transport  and  of  provisions  were 
enormous,  for  beyond  Joazeiro  no  food  was  to  be 
obtained  ;  pasture  and  grass  were  scarce,  roads  non- 
existent, and  the  track  led  through  deep  defiles,  bushy 
and  strewn  with  rocks.  The  troops  left  Joazeiro  on 
the  night  of  the  12th,  so  as  to  avoid  a  start  on  the 
1 3th,  deemed  an  unlucky  day. 

Two  hundred  kilometres  separated  Joazeiro  from 
the  prophet's  stronghold.  Summer*  was  just  begin- 
ing.  The  nights  were  icy,  whilst  the  noonday  sun 
poured  down  like  fire,  making  the  change  of  tempera- 
ture at  sunset  more  difficult  to  bear.  The  wells  were 
few  and  far  between,  and  the  two  guides  hired  at 
Joazeiro  not  over  trustworthy.  Moreover,  most  of 
the  troops  were  men  of  colour  from  the  hot  regions 
of  the  coast,  unused  to  cold  and  unaccustomed  to 
long  marches  amongst  hills.  None  of  them  were 
broken  to  frontier  warfare,  and  all  were  quite  at  sea  in 
wars  of  ambushes,  surprises,  and  of  night  alarms.  The 
*  In  the  southern  hemisphere. 


144  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

season  was  unusually  dry  and  hot,  and  the  scant 
herbage  had  almost  disappeared.  The  trees  began  to 
shed  their  leaves  under  the  scorching  heat,  and  looked 
like  skeletons.  At  the  rare  springs  and  pools  the 
cattle  crowding  to  slake  their  thirst  had  trampled  them 
into  a  slough  of  mud.  In  the  Sertao  in  summer  few 
people  travel  after  ten  o'clock,  in  the  fierce  heat  that 
turns  the  sandy  trails  into  a  sea  of  fire.  Those  who 
are  forced  to  do  so  travel  on  horseback  or  on  mules. 
The  unlucky  soldiers  had  to  march  on  foot,  wrapped 
in  a  cloud  of  dust.  The  country  in  itself  was  poor, 
the  very  scrub  falling  into  the  category  of  what  is 
known  as  Caatanduva* — that  is,  the  "  weak  bush." 
The  expedition  had  to  cross  a  country  wild  and 
uncultivated,  almost  unknown  to  most  Brazilians  ;  a 
land  of  thirst  in  which  all  human  habitations  of 
necessity  are  rare,  and  even  these  the  soldiers  found 
deserted — an  evil  omen  for  an  invading  force  in  any 
country.  The  first  day  they  were  forced  to  camp 
upon  the  open  plains  only  two  leagues  from  Joazeiro, 
and  passed  the  night  short  of  provisions  and  shivering 
with  cold. 

Next  day  a  stage  of  forty  kilometres  faced  them. 
Water  was  only  to  be  found  at  a  little  lake  called 
"  A  lagoa  do  Boi,"-j"  where  still  a  little  water  lingered 
in  the  bottom  of  the  pool.  They  reached  it  almost 
exhausted,  though  without  attack  from  the  Jagun9os, 
and  slept  upon  the  ground,  far  too  fatigued  to  put  up 
tents  or  do  more  than  light  a  fire  or  two.      For  the 

*  From  Caa,  "  bushwood,"  and  Ahiva,  "  weak  or  bad,"  in 
Guarani  or  Tupi. 

t  The  bullocks'  water-hole  or  pool. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  145 

next  few  days  they  passed  a  veritable  via  cruets, 
finding  the  villages  deserted,  and  seeing  nothing  but  a 
few  goats  amongst  the  rocks,  as  shy  as  deer,  and,  now 
and  then,  some  cattle  which  had  run  half  wild  and 
galloped  off  at  their  approach.  The  mirage  mocked 
them,  spreading  illusory  lakes  a  mile  in  front,  and 
then  when  they  had  struggled  on,  hoping  to  slake  their 
thirst,  vanishing  altogether,  or  moving  farther  off 

At  last,  on  the  19th,  they  reached  Uaua,  a  miserable 
village,  with  two  straggling  streets  that  ran  into  a 
square,  sandy  and  desolate,  set  round  with  cabins  and 
with  huts.  A  store  or  two,  flat-roofed  and  stuccoed, 
with  iron-grated  windows,  and  several  hitching  posts 
before  the  door,  a  church  in  bad  repair,  and  a  series  of 
corrals,  to  which  on  fair  days  Vaqueiros  drove  their 
cattle  or  their  mules,  were  the  chief  feature  of  the 
wretched  little  place.  The  fairs  held  upon  feast-days 
were  the  occasions  when  the  town  put  on  an  air  of 
animation,  that  it  put  off  again  the  instant  that  the 
fair  was  over,  and  fell  back  into  sleep. 

Throughout  Brazil  and  in  most  parts  of  South 
America  the  siesta  wraps  the  world  in  sleep  during 
the  hotter  hours,  a  death-like  silence  steals  upon  the 
world,  and  nothing  but  the  buzzing  of  the  flies  is 
heard,  or  the  occasional  stamping  of  a  horse  tied  up 
beneath  a  tree.  The  flag  upon  the  "  Comandancia  " 
flaps  lazily  against  the  staff,  like  the  leach  of  a  sail 
flaps  in  a  calm,  or  hangs  down  limp  like  a  dead  vul- 
ture set  up  to  scare  the  parrots  from  a  cornfield.  So 
deeply  are  its  votaries  given  over  to  their  slumbers, 
that  a  man  may  ride  into  a  store  through  the  broad 
doorway,  stooping  a  little  as  he  passes  under  it,  and 

10 


146  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

rap  with   his   whip's   handle   on  the  counter  ;    then, 
finding  no  response,  wheel  round  his  horse  and  ride 
him  out  again,  leaving  the  owner  of  the  store  unaware 
of  his   visit,  and   still   sleeping  like  the   dead.      The 
sleepers  in  the  little   town  of  Uaua  were  awakened 
by  the  strains  of  a  bugle  sounding  in  the  square.     The 
unusual  sound   of   martial  music  prevailed  over  the 
habit  of  a  lifetime,  and  they  appeared  to  welcome  to 
their    town    the    force    the    Government    had    sent. 
Great  was  their  astonishment  to  see  halted  upon  the 
plaza  the  miserable,  thirst-stricken,  and  forlorn-looking 
little  band  of  soldiers  that  had  just  struggled  in  and 
thrown   themselves   upon  the    ground    in    weariness. 
The  men  were  dusty,  footsore,  and  tired  out.     Their 
ranks  were  badly  dressed,  and  most  of  them  carried 
their  jackets  hanging  from  their  guns.     Their  officers 
were  mounted  upon  mules  or   pack-ponies  that  they 
had  bought  or  commandeered  in    Joazeiro,   and  the 
whole    aspect    of    the    little    force    was    melancholy 
and  dispiriting. 

After  a  rest  they  set  up  bivouacs — for  tents  were 
non-existent  as  they  had  no  pack  animals  to  carry 
them.  Cutting  down  palm-leaves,  they  built  up  little 
shelters  against  the  scorching  sun,  and  stationed 
sentinels  at  the  four  corners  of  the  square  in  order  to 
command  the  roads.  Then  they  made  coffee  and  ate 
a  miserable  meal,  having  no  energy  to  cook  after  their 
sufferings.  By  all  the  rules  of  military  strategy  and 
of  common-sense,  they  ought  to  have  pushed  on 
towards  Canudos  an  hour  or  two  before  the  sun  was 
up,  to  avoid  the  heat,  and  to  endeavour  to  surprise 
the  prophet's  stronghold,  for  in  a  prompt  surprise  lay 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  147 

their  scant  chances  of  success.  This,  the  commander 
found  impossible  owing  to  the  condition  of  his  men. 
and  the  fact  that  the  road  before  them  ran  through  a 
desert,  in  which  the  man  who  wandered  from  the 
track  was  doomed  to  death  by  hunger  or  by  thirst. 
The  guides  from  Joazeiro  were  uncertain  of  the  track, 
or  said  they  were,  most  likely  sympathising  secretly 
with  Antonio  Conselheiro,  and  willing  to  lose  time. 

The  20th  passed  in  rest  and  in  the  search  for  informa- 
tion, both  on  the  situation  and  the  road.  At  nightfall 
the  commander,  going  on  his  rounds,  found  the  whole 
town  deserted,  for  the  inhabitants  had  silently  with- 
drawn, either  because  they  feared  to  be  exposed  to  the 
attack  which  they  looked  on  as  certain,  or  on  an  order 
from  the  prophet  sent  to  them  secretly.  This  fact 
should  have  alarmed  the  commander  of  the  troops  had 
he  but  taken  in  the  danger  of  his  situation  and  the 
impossibility  of  receiving  reinforcements  at  such  a 
distance  from  his  base.  He  took  no  heed  of  the 
occurrence,  and  the  troops  lay  down  beneath  their 
bivouacs,  sleeping  as  tranquilly  as  if  Antonio  Consel- 
heiro and  his  men  were  all  a  thousand  miles  away  from 
them.  An  hour  or  two  before  the  sun  rose,  the 
favourite  moment  for  attack  on  every  frontier,  the 
advance  guard  of  the  Jagun^os  appeared.  Formed  in 
procession,  carrying  banners  of  the  saints  and  singing 
hymns,  their  army  seemed  a  band  of  pilgrims  mount- 
ing a  Calvary.  All  were  armed  in  some  fashion  or 
other,  with  guns  and  swords,  cattle-goads,  axes,  scythes 
set  upright  upon  poles,  or  some  rude  weapon  or 
another  which  they  found  ready  to  their  hands. 

All   carried   knives,    and  many  bore  old-fashioned 


148  LIFE  AND  xMIRACLES  OF 

flint-lock  pistols  and  bell-mouthed  blunderbusses. 
Some,  in  default  of  other  arms,  had  clubs,  and  some 
rough  slings,  which  they  used  commonly  for  herding 
cattle  on  the  plains.  A  motley  crew,  but  all  inspired 
with  faith  in  their  great  Councillor,  who  had  assured 
them  of  the  victory  over  the  soldiers  of  the  "  Dog."* 
Some  told  their  beads  as  they  advanced,  and  some 
prayed  loudly,  brandishing  their  arms.  Though  they 
advanced  quite  openly  and  singing  as  they  marched  to 
the  number  of  about  three  thousand,  as  an  eye-witness 
says,  they  met  with  no  resistance  till  they  arrived  upon 
the  outskirts  of  the  town. 

Fearing  an  ambush,  Pajehu,  who  was  in  chief 
command,  halted  his  followers  and  stayed  their 
psalmody,  and  then  sent  out  some  scouts.  These 
penetrated  to  the  sentinels  placed  at  the  four  cross 
roads,  and  found  them  sleeping  at  their  posts,  and  all 
the  town  asleep.  As  they  returned  with  the  astound- 
ing news  towards  the  main  body,  they  encountered 
three  advanced  guards,  who,  springing  to  their  feet, 
fired  ofl^  their  carbines  and  retreated  to  the  town. 
Roused  from  his  slumbers,  dressed  in  his  shirt  and 
drawers,  as  he  had  risen  from  his  bed,  the  colonel  in 
command  hurried  down  to  the  plaza  with  a  bugler  by 
his  side,  who  sounded  the  alarm. 

Soldiers  came  scurrying  from  their  bivouacs,  and 
from  the  houses  of  the  town,  where  they  were 
sleeping  to  shelter  from  the  cold,  dressing  and 
loading  as  they  ran.  Scant  time  they  had  to  form 
their  ranks,  though  an  old  sergeant  died  bravely  at 

*  The  "  Dog  "  typified  the  republic.  AH  its  laws  they  called 
"  the  law  of  the  dog  "— "  A  lei  do  Cao." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  149 

his  post  trying  to  stem  the  tide.  With  yells  and  cries 
of  "Bom  Jesus!"  and  "Viva  Conselheiro  !"  the 
Jagun9os  fell  upon  them.  The  line  was  never  formed, 
and  in  an  instant  in  the  semi-darkness  all  v^as  con- 
fusion, and  the  troops  struggled  for  their  lives.  The 
instinct  of  self-preservation,  or  the  remains  of  discipline, 
made  them  stand  together  and  retreat  tow^ards  the 
houses,  where  they  re-formed  and  fired  upon  the 
sectaries  from  windows  and  from  doors. 

This  was  the  means  of  the  salvation  of  a  good  many 
of  the  troops,  for  the  Jagun9os,  grouped  in  masses  on  the 
square,  replied  but  feebly  to  their  fire.  Huddled 
together  like  a  flock  of  sheep,  exposed  to  fire  from 
modern  rifles,  and  only  able  to  reply  with  blunder- 
busses and  old-fashioned  guns,  the  followers  of  the 
prophet  soon  suffered  a  considerable  loss.  Decimated, 
without  being  able  to  reply,  the  Jagun9o  leaders 
saw  their  only  chance  was  in  a  general  attack 
upon  the  houses  where  the  soldiers  were  entrenched. 
Grouped  round  their  sacred  banner  they  came  on, 
shouting  their  war-cries  mixed  with  pious  adjurations, 
though  every  volley  stretched  dozens  of  them  on  the 
ground.  Brandishing  their  goads  and  knives,  they 
reached  the  houses  where  the  colonel,  still  in  his 
shirt  and  drawers,  stood  giving  out  cartridges  to  his 
fast  falling  men,  under  a  heavy  fire. 

A  sub-lieutenant,  standing  half  naked  on  the  bed 
from  which  he  had  been  roused  by  the  attack,  stood 
bravely  firing  through  the  window,  until  a  bullet 
stretched  him  lifeless  on  the  bed  in  which  so  lately 
he  had  slept.  It  seemed  as  if  the  houses  must  be 
carried  and  the  troops  overwhelmed  in  the  impetuous 


ISO  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

rush  of  the  Jagun^os,  who  came  on  careless  of  their 
lives,  disdaining  even  to  take  cover  in  the  fury  of 
their  charge.  The  rush  just  failed,  and  slowly, 
vociferating  imprecations,  the  sectaries  fell  back,  and, 
as  by  magic,  all  disappeared  into  the  woods. 

As  they  were  disappearing  the  sun  rose,  as  he  rises 
in  the  tropics,  without  an  interval  of  twilight,  and  in 
the  morning  light  the  town  looked  tragical.  Dead 
bodies  lay  about  in  front  of  every  doorstep,  and  blood 
had  soaked  the  balconies  and  window  frames.  Three 
or  four  houses  had  been  set  on  fire,  and  in  the  lurid 
light  cast  by  their  flames  upon  the  scene,  the  wounded 
tried  to  drag  themselves  to  shelter,  whilst  the  exhausted 
soldiers,  too  tired  to  aid  them,  throwing  themselves 
down  half  lifeless  on  the  ground,  slept  as  men  sleep 
after  a  night  of  struggle  for  their  lives. 

About  two  hundred  of  the  sectaries  were  killed  or 
dangerously  wounded,  and  all  the  latter  the  soldiers 
conscientiously  put  out  of  their  suffering  when  they 
awoke  from  sleep.  The  troops  had  ten  men  killed, 
amongst  them  the  brave  sub-lieutenant  slain  upon  his 
bed,  a  sergeant  and  the  two  guides  that  they  had  hired 
in  Joazeiro.  The  doctor  of  the  expedition  had  gone 
mad  during  the  combat,  either  from  terror  or  from  the 
hardships  he  had  undergone  upon  the  march.  Thus 
he  was  useless  to  the  sixteen  wounded,  whose  wounds 
were  dressed  in  the  best  fashion  they  were  able  by 
their  own  comrades,  who  tore  their  shirts  up  to  make 
bandages. 

The  Government  had  gained  a  Pyrrhic  victory. 
The  colonel  still  had  sixty  soldiers,  unwounded  but 
much  discouraged,  for,  for  the  first  time,  they  could 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  151 

appreciate  the  courage  of  the  enemy  and  understand 
what  difficulties  lay  before  them  if  they  pursued  their 
task.      Placed   as   he   was,   cumbered   with    wounded 
men  tor  whom  he  had  no  transport,  both  his  guides 
killed,  and  totally  without  the  means  of  getting  any 
reinforcements,   one    course    alone    was  open   to   the 
commander  of  the  troops.     At  all  events,  he  had  to 
evacuate  the  place  before  the  darkness  should  expose 
him  to  a  fresh  attack  on  his  exhausted  men.     Their 
comrades  buried  hurriedly  in  the  cemetery,  the  troops 
at  once  set  out  upon  the  march  under  the  torrid  sun. 
Most  luckily  for  them,  the  Jagun9os,  after  the  check 
they  had  received,  did  not  appear  again,  for  had  they 
done  so  not  a  single  man  would  have  remained  alive. 
Four  days  of  agony   were  passed   upon  the  trail  to 
Joazeiro,  which  they  reached   more  like  a  mob   of 
fugitives  than  like  a  band  of  soldiers  who  had  stood 
bravely   to   their  arms   against   superior  force.     The 
water-holes  had  nearly  all  dried  up,  and  by  the  second 
day  provisions  were  exhausted,  and  the  unlucky  men 
struggled  along  supporting  one  another,  falling  down 
but  to  die. 

When  they  arrived  at  Joazeiro  and  staggered  into 
the  town,  the  population  looked  on  them  with  amaze- 
ment, so  great  a  change  had  come  upon  them  all  in 
the  disastrous  campaign.  Dusty  and  ragged,  half- 
starved  and  wounded,  tortured  by  thirst,  and  footsore 
with  the  road,  they  scarce  had  spirit  to  relate  all  that 
had  happened  to  them.  The  very  sight  of  them 
caused  such  a  panic  in  the  town  that  the  men  fit  to 
bear  arms  ran  armed  into  the  square,  thinking  that  the 
Jagun90s  might  be  expected  to  attack  the  town  at  any 


152     LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 

minute,  as  they  supposed  that  they  were  following  up 
the  trail.  Trains  with  their  engine  fires  lighted  and 
a  full  head  of  steam  stood  waiting  in  the  station,  ready 
to  take  the  inhabitants  away  at  the  first  symptom  of 
alarm. 

Nothing  occurred,  as  the  Jagun9os  had  no  idea  ot 
following  up  their  Pyrrhic  conquerors,  for  they  knew 
well  enough  they  had  inflicted  a  reverse  upon  the 
Government. 


CHAPTER  XI 

Rumour,  ever  an  active  agent  in  countries  like  Brazil, 
soon  magnified  the  situation  far  beyond  due  bounds. 
The  most  absurd  report  of  the  strength  of  the  forces 
that  Antonio  Conselheiro  had  at  his  disposal  soon 
began  to  be  believed.  It  was  asserted  that  he 
was  well  supplied  with  arms,  and  with  artillery, 
by  the  Monarchists.  In  point  of  fact  the  party 
favourable  to  a  restitution  of  the  Imperial  power  was 
negligible.  No  arms,  except  a  few  dozen  modern 
rifles  which  had  been  smuggled  in,  had  reached 
Canudos,  and  artillery  there  was  none.  Upon  the 
other  hand,  the  withdrawal  of  the  Government  forces 
had  brought  in  hundreds  of  recruits,  though  it  is 
most  improbable  that  at  the  most  the  prophet  ever 
disposed  of  more  than  five  thousand  fighting  men, 
and  even  these  were  quite  inadequately  armed. 

Still,  it  behoved  the  Government  to  make  "  an  act 
of  presence"*  by  fitting  out  an  expedition  large 
enough  to  ensure  success.  Therefore  they  got  to- 
gether a  formidable  force— that  is,  formidable  for  such 
a  purpose — and  one  that  ought  to  have  been  able  to 
reduce  the  sectaries  had  it  been  rightly  used. 

The  federal  Governor  wrote  to  the  Capital  demand- 
*  "  Urn  acto  de  presen^a." 
153 


154  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

ing  an  armed  force  of  about  six  hundred  soldiers,  with 
two  Krupp  field-guns  and  four  Nordenfeldts.  This 
imposing  force  would  have  seemed  ridiculous  for  the 
reduction  of  an  open  village,  defended  but  by  men 
armed  with  antique  weapons,  had  it  not  been  for  the 
difficulties  of  the  road  and  the  peculiar  nature  of  the 
warfare  which  the  last  expedition  had  disclosed. 

The  whole  military  force  was  placed  under  the 
direction  of  Colonel  Pedro  Nunes  Tamarindo,  a  man 
experienced  in  warfare,  but  not  in  the  particular  kind 
of  fighting  that  he  was  called  upon  to  meet.  In  the 
first  encounter  at  Uaua,  the  Jagun^os  had  allowed 
themselves  to  be  engaged  precisely  in  the  circum- 
stances that  were  unfavourable  to  them  and  advan- 
tageous to  the  troops.  Massed  in  the  plaza  of  the 
town,  they  fell  in  heaps  when  exposed  to  modern 
rifle  fire.  The  example  was  a  warning  to  them,  and 
they  never  fell  into  the  same  mistake  during  the 
warfare  that  ensued.  It  is  probable  that  in  the  attack 
on  Uaua,  blinded  by  fanaticism,  and  relying  on  superior 
numbers,  they  thought  to  carry  everything  in  the  first 
rush.  They  were  deceived,  and  henceforth  took  full 
advantage  of  their  knowledge  of  the  Sertao,  their 
great  mobility,  and  of  the  difficult  nature  of  the 
country  through  which  the  enemy  was  bound  to 
pass.  Few  countries  in  the  world  are  naturally  easier 
to  defend.  The  thick,  impenetrable  bush  that  juts 
out  in  islands  and  peninsulas  into  the  plains,  the  hills 
covered  with  boulders,  the  tracks  that  wind  about 
knee-deep  in  sand  or  mud  according  to  the  season  ; 
the  want  of  water  in  the  summer  and  the  floods  in 
winter,  and  above  all  the  scarcity  of  provisions,  render 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  155 

a  campaign  in  the  Sertao  a  formidable  undertaking 
even  to  seasoned  troops. 

The  plan  of  Colonel  Tamarindo  was  to  attack  by 
means  of  two  converging  columns,  and  so  to  break 
the  resistance  of  the  sectaries  before  he  had  arrived  at 
his  objective,  hoping  that  they   would  fall  into   the 
trap.      In  reality,  no  plan  could  possibly  have  been 
less  likely  of  success  in  such  a  country  and  with  such 
enemies.     The  governmental  forces  entered  the  town 
of  Monte   Santo   on  the   27th   of  December,    1896. 
This   town,  the    birthplace    of   the    missionary   friar 
Appollonio  de  Todi,*  was  situated  on  the  slope  of  a 
hill,  from  which  all  the  surrounding  country  could  be 
seen.     It  lies  in  the  extreme  north  of  the  province  of 
Bahia,  close  to  the  frontiers  of  the  States  of  Piauhy, 
of  Alagoas  and  Sergipe,  not  far  from  the  River  Vasa- 
Barris,  a  considerable  stream.     It  was  there  that  Frei 
Appollonio  de  Todi  had  reared  his  temple  and  made 
his  Calvary,  which,  paved  with  pieces  of  the  whitest 
quartz  imaginable,  winds  its  way  up  the  hill.     Monte 
Santo,  situated  as  it  was,  not  more  than  thirty  kilo- 
metres from  the  railhead  at  Queimadas,  formed  the 
base   of   attack    for    all    the    expeditions    which    the 
Government  found  itself  forced  to  send.     The  town 
had    never    seen    so  great  a    force,   or    one    so    well 
equipped   with   tents    and    military   stores    and   with 
artillery.     At   the  review  the  colonel  held  the  first 
day  after  he  arrived,   he  mustered  five  hundred  and 
forty-three  men  of  the  rank-and-file,   with   fourteen 
officers   and  three  doctors.     To  these  were  added  a 
small   artillery  division  with  the  two  Krupp  cannons 

"^  See  Introduction. 


156  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

and  the  four  Nordenfeldt  quick-firing  guns.  Besides  all 
these  there  were  about  two  hundred  police.  Nothing 
had  ever  been  seen  before  on  such  a  scale  in  the 
quiet  town  to  which  so  many  pilgrims  used  to  resort 
in  times  of  peace.  All  the  day  long  the  inhabitants 
were  in  the  streets  or  straying  close  to  the  encamp- 
ment, gazing  admiringly  at  the  new  uniforms  and 
brilliant  rifles  of  the  soldiers,  and  looking  with  amaze- 
ment at  the  artillery.  The  Vaqueiros,  who  had  come 
in  from  the  country,  tied  their  campeao*  under  a  tree 
and  passed  the  day  in  staring  at  the  troops.  Some, 
genuinely  alarmed  at  the  awful-looking  guns,  mounted 
their  horses  and  returned  to  the  shelter  of  the  Caatin- 
gas  ;  others,  who  had  been  sent  as  spies,  galloped  off 
towards  Canudos  to  tell  what  they  had  seen.  No  one 
took  any  notice  of  them  in  the  general  festivities  that 
were  taking  place.  So,  whilst  the  people  of  the  town 
and  all  the  officers  of  the  expedition  thought  that 
victory  was  secure,  and  a  mere  military  procession 
with  a  show  of  force  would  settle  the  whole  thing, 
Antonio  Conselheiro  was  informed  of  the  last  detail 
of  their  strength,  and  laid  his  plans  to  compass  their 
defeat.  All  were  not  thus  deceived,  and  many  of  the 
country  people,  wrapped  in  their  ponchos,  as  they 
lounged  about  the  street,  looked  on  the  troops  ironi- 
cally, foreseeing  that  the  festivities  would  end  in  tears, 
for  as  they  said,  "They  are  delivered  like  dumb  oxen 
into  the  hands  of  our  good  Councillor." 

The  town  authorities  gave  a  banquet  to  the  officers. 
At  this  festivity  the  discourses,  packed  with  allusions 

*  Literally  "  the  Champion  " — i.e.^  the  best  horse.     The  Gauchos 
use  the  phrase  "  El  Credito,"  in  the  same  way,  for  their  best  horse. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  157 

to  "  our  Brazilian  mothers,"  our  "  great  and  glorious 
land,"  and  freedom,  themes  which  with  little  variation 
re-occur  in  every  speech  in  South  America,  brought 
forth  the  usual  cheers.  Our  Country,  Glory,  and 
Eternal  Liberty,  a  goddess  accountable  for  millions  of 
ineptitudes  in  politics  and  in  orations,  were  duly 
toasted.  All  agreed  that  in  a  week  or  two,  or  at  the 
most  a  month,  the  expedition  would  return  "  bearing 
the  laurel  with  their  arms."  It  was  the  general 
conviction  that  victory  was  assured,  and  all  looked 
forward  to  the  time  "  when  the  barbarity  which  has 
been  the  scandal  of  our  native  land  shall  disappear 
and  be  succeeded  by  a  reign  of  progress  and  of  peace." 
All  this,  of  course,  as  is  the  case  in  all  such  speeches 
and  on  such  occasions,  was  to  be  brought  about  by 
blood,  for  blood  is  the  baptismal  water  by  which 
peace  is  ensured.  As  peril  often  raises  the  spirits  of 
an  army,  so  does  the  certainty  of  victory  serve  to  de- 
press the  energy  of  troops,  making  them  over-confident, 
and  apt  to  fall  into  a  panic  if  anything  goes  wrong. 
This  was  the  case  in  Monte  Santo,  where  the  expedi- 
tion remained  for  fifteen  days,  banqueting,  speechify- 
ing, and  losing  time.  With  such  an  enemy  as  they 
had  to  face,  success  depended  upon  speed.  Had  they 
marched  on  without  delay,  they  might  have  found 
Canudos  unprepared,  ready  to  fall  into  their  hands. 
As  it  was,  the  prophet  had  had  ample  time  to  elabo- 
rate the  plans  for  his  defence.  Part  of  the  munitions 
had  been  left  at  the  railhead  at  Queimadas,  and  these 
had  not  arrived  during  the  fifteen  days  that  had  been 
spent  at  Monte  Santo  in  banqueting  and  idleness.  As 
often  happens  in  the  like  circumstances  after  a  loss 


158  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

of  time,  there  comes  a  fit  of  energy  and  a  desire  to 
embark  at  once  upon  the  enterprise.  This  happened 
now,  and  Colonel  Tamarindo,  having  left  half  of  his 
munitions,  determined  to  halve  those  he  had  with  him 
at  Monte  Santo  and  start  at  once  upon  the  track. 
This  he  did,  not  being  able  to  find  sufficient  transport 
and  knowing  that  his  success  depended  on  his  speed. 
The  resolution  was  fatal,  and  his  brigade  marched  out 
to  certain  ruin  and  defeat. 

Had  he  but  followed  his  first  plan  or  an  advance  in 
double  columns,  one  marching  at  a  little  distance  from 
the  other,  all  might  have  been  well.  This  plan 
would  have  allowed  him  to  make  use  of  his  artillery 
upon  a  double  flank,  and  then  converge  upon  Canudos, 
as  the  objective  of  his  march.  Colonel  Tamarindo, 
on  the  contrary,  started  from  Monte  Santo  on  the  1 3th 
of  January  (1897)  ^^  ^  single  column,  and  marched  in 
close-formed  ranks.  In  the  deep  sand  the  marching 
columns  suffered  horribly  from  dust,  and  the  men  soon 
commenced  to  flag,  after  their  period  of  inaction  in 
the  town.  Water  was  scarce,  and  hardly  to  be  met 
with,  and  when  they  were  attacked  their  close  forma- 
tion made  them  an  easy  target  to  the  hidden  enemy. 
The  road  from  Monte  Santo  to  Canudos — if  road  it  can 
be  called,  being  in  reality  but  a  mere  cattle  track — runs 
through  the  Curiaca  valley,  passing  at  first  through 
cultivated  lands.  Then  it  turns  to  the  east  by  the  slopes 
of  Acaru  and  becomes  stonier.  From  there  it  crosses 
several  ridges  of  foothills,  passing  through  winding 
bush  paths,  and  then  comes  out  into  the  open  at  a 
place  called  Lagem  de  Dentro,  a  sort  of  plateau  of 
about  nine  hundred  feet  in  height. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  159 

Here  they  encamped,  after  two  days  of  painful  march- 
ing in  the  sand.  The  two  Krupp  guns  had  terribly 
delayed  their  progress,  for  the  roads  were  so  bad  that 
sappers  had  to  go  in  front  to  prepare  a  path  for  them. 
This  took  away  the  mobility  of  the  column,  and  on 
mobility  depended  its  success.  Had  it  been  able  to 
arrive  before  Canudos  in  a  reasonable  time,  and  open 
fire  at  once  with  its  artillery  well  supplied  with 
ammunition,  the  campaign  might  have  been  over  in  a 
week.  As  it  turned  out,  the  stars  fought  for  the 
prophet,  for  the  commander  of  the  forces  of  the 
Government  fell  into  innumerable  mistakes.  From 
Lagem  de  Dentro  the  road  runs  through  a  deep 
and  narrow  pass  to  the  next  halting-place,  called 
Ipureiras.  The  marches  were  determined,  as  they  are 
in  Africa,  by  the  distance  of  the  water-holes.  After  a 
long  day  they  camped  at  Ipureiras,  a  miserable  place, 
with  only  a  small  water-hole,  and  dominated  on  every 
side  by  hills.  Luckily  for  them,  the  night  passed 
without  attack.  Next  day  they  arrived  at  Penedo, 
half-way  to  Canudos,  and  their  spirits  once  again 
began  to  rise.  From  this  point,  the  road  became  even 
more  difficult.  Cattle  tracks  crossed  it  repeatedly, 
making  it  extremely  hard  to  keep  on  the  right  path. 
All  day  they  weltered  in  the  sand,  without  a  drop  of 
water  or  a  particle  of  shade  against  the  sun,  making 
but  scarce  two  leagues,  and  reaching  a  deserted  farm, 
called  Mulunga,  as  night  began  to  fall.  Fires  just  ex- 
tinguished, but  still  smouldering,  told  of  encampments 
of  the  enemy,  and  in  the  distance  clouds  of  dust  were 
rising  on  the  horizon  far  away,  raised  by  the  cattle  as 
they  were  driven  in  towards  the  town.       Everything 


i6o  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

spoke  of  the  proximity  of  the  enemy.       The  soldiers 
slept    upon    their    arms.       During    the    night    vague 
shadows  came  and  went  near  the  encampment,  and 
once  or  twice    the   alarm  was  sounded,   so   that    by 
morning  they  were  glad  to  leave  the  place.       Three 
days  of  steady  marching  still  intervened  between  them 
and  Canudos  ;  but,  by  this  time,  the  condition  of  the 
troops  had  become  perilous.     Provisions  had  run  low, 
and,  at  Mulunga,  they  were  obliged  to  kill  their  last 
two  bullocks,  whose  flesh  furnished  a  mere  mouthful 
when    shared    amongst    five    or    six    hundred    men. 
Disaster  stared  them  in  the  face,  and,  in  their  difficulty. 
Colonel  Tamarindo,  being  ashamed  to  retreat  before  a 
shot  was  fired,  came  to  the  almost  desperate  resolution 
of  pushing  on,  hoping  to  take  Canudos  with  a  rush, 
and  then  secure  provisions  for  his  men.     They  started 
before  daylight,  and  the  first  rays  of  light   disclosed 
the  fact  that  the  men  with  the  pack-mules,  hired  in 
Monte  Santo,  had  all  deserted  and  gone  back.       One 
guide  remained,  a  man  called  Domingos  Jesuino,  and 
he  proved  loyal  to  them.     By  devious  paths  he  led  the 
column  to  a  place  called  Rancho  das  Pedras,  where 
they  bivouacked,  being  too  exhausted  to  erect  their 
tents,  or  to  do  anything  but  sleep. 

Only  two  leagues  now  separated  them  from  Canu- 
dos, and  all  night  long  they  saw  the  camp  fires  of  the 
Jagun9os,  twinkling  like  stars  on  every  side  of  them. 
Still  there  was  no  attack.  At  daybreak,  hungry  and 
footsore,  they  broke  camp,  and  with  their  artillery 
dragged  along  by  ropes,  began  to  move  towards  the 
town.  In  front  of  them  rose  Mount  Cambaio,  like 
an  enchanted  city,  its  rocks  worn  by  the  weather  into 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  i6i 

pinnacles  and  towers.  It  seemed  to  bar  the  road,  but 
their  guide  led  them  by  a  path  close  to  the  foot  of  it. 
They  passed  it  shuddering,  waiting  for  the  attack,  so 
long  delayed  that  it  had  made  the  soldiers  panicky. 
Beyond  Cambaio  the  road  runs  straight  without  a 
turn,  between  high  cliffs.  Far  in  the  distance,  like  a 
landscape  seen  at  the  wrong  end  of  a  telescope, 
appeared  Canudos,  brown  and  menacing. 

Though  the  road  seemed  quite  level,  there  were 
depressions  in  it,  invisible  till  they  approached  them, 
and  in  one  of  these,  as  they  toiled  wearily  along,  their 
fingers  on  the  triggers  of  their  guns,  the  long  expected, 
long  delayed  attack  was  launched  on  them.  Upon  the 
rocks  on  each  side  of  the  road,  as  if  by  magic,  the 
Jagun9os  suddenly  appeared.  Rifle-fire  crackled  to 
the  accompaniment  of  yells  of  "  Bom  Jesus  !"  and 
"  Viva  Conselheiro  !"  Homeric  taunts  were  hurled 
at  them,  the  Jagun^os  yelling,  "  Let  the  weakness  of 
the  Government  advance  !"*  and,  under  the  brisk  fire, 
three  or  four  soldiers  fell. 

The  situation  became  critical.  A  dangerous  tremor 
ran  along  the  line,  making  it  quiver  like  a  snake.  A 
moment  more  and  it  would  have  given  way,  and,  if 
it  had  once  broken,  not  a  man  would  have  returned 
alive.  However,  in  most  crises,  there  stands  out  a 
man  to  meet  and  dominate  them.  Major  Febronio, 
rushing  to  the  front,  in  a  few  moments  inspired 
confidence,  and  the  exhausted,  thirst-tortured  soldiers 
put  up  a  brave  fight.  From  every  side,  rocks  were 
showered  down  upon  them,  but  they  were  able  to 
stand  off  the  Jagun90s  with  their  artillery.     A  rush  in 

*  "  Avan^a  fraqueza  do  governo." 

II 


1 62  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

superior  force  broke  up  the  soldiers  into  groups,  which 
still  advanced  to  clear  themselves  from  the  defile. 
Little  by  little  superior  weapons  carried  the  day,  and, 
after  a  tumultuous  struggle,  the  troops  arrived  upon 
the  outskirts  of  the  town  and  hurriedly  encamped, 
after  three  hours  of  fight.  The  ammunition  was 
nearly  done,  owing  to  the  folly  of  the  commander  in 
having  left  so  much  of  it  behind.  Still,  so  far,  they 
had  achieved  a  victory,  as  nearly  three  hundred 
corpses,  stretched  upon  the  ground  in  front  of  them, 
were  there  to  testify.  The  actual  losses  of  the  troops 
were  ten  or  twelve  men  killed  and  sixty  wounded. 
The  last  formed  a  grave  problem,  as  lack  of  transport 
forced  them  to  be  carried  in  rough  litters,  which 
rendered  the  retreat  both  slow  and  difficult.  Once 
more  their  triumph  was  illusive,  and,  situated  as  they 
were,  without  provisions  and  obliged  to  go  for  water 
under  fire,  their  position  was  most  perilous,  even  with 
victory  in  their  grasp.  As  soon  as  they  had  rested  for 
an  hour  or  two.  Colonel  Tamarindo  held  a  hasty 
council,  and  put  the  only  two  alternatives  that  were 
possible  before  his  officers.  If  they  pushed  on  at 
daybreak  and  attacked  the  town,  in  the  event  of 
carrying  it  at  once,  provisions  were  secure ;  but  if 
they  failed  in  the  face  of  such  superior  forces,  and 
with  ammunition  running  short,  their  fate  was  sealed, 
and  the  whole  expedition  would  be  lost. 

So  they  decided,  most  unwillingly,  upon  retreat. 
All  through  the  night  there  were  alarms,  and,  when 
day  broke,  they  saw  they  were  surrounded  by  the 
enemy.  Nothing  remained  but  to  break  through  at 
any    cost,   before   starvation  rendered  them   an    easy 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  163 

prey  to  the  Jagun9os,  who  were  thirsting  for  their 
blood.  They  observed  a  man,  tall,  bronzed  and 
hideous,  his  face  contracted  in  a  savage  grin,  mar- 
shalling the  enemy.  Standing  amongst  a  rain  of 
bullets,  he  bore  apparently  a  charmed  life,  and,  as  he 
passed  along  the  ranks,  a  savage  yell,  like  that  raised 
by  wild  Indians,  broke  from  his  followers.  This  was 
the  celebrated  Pajehu,  who,  certainly  on  that  occasion, 
confirmed  his  well-known  courage  amply,  and  dis- 
played most  of  the  qualities  of  a  guerilla  general. 

As  the  troops  were  forced  once  more  to  enter  the 
defile  below  Monte  Cambaio  to  gain  the  open  road, 
Pajehu  reserved  his  main  attack  till  they  were  passing 
underneath  the  rocks.  There,  after  lining  all  the 
cliffs  with  sharp-shooters,  he  himself  headed  a  fierce 
rush  on  the  retiring  troops.  So  impetuous  was  the 
onslaught  that  the  Jagun9os  soon  were  mixedjup  with 
the  soldiers,  and  fought  them  hand  to  hand.  Men 
strove  with  bayonets  and  with  knives,  with  cattle 
goads,  and  with  clubbed  rifles,  all  fighting  for  their 
lives.  One  of  the  Krupp  guns  jammed  and  was 
silenced,  and  Pajehu,  rushing  up,  like  a  warrior  of  the 
siege  of  Troy,  threw  his  arms  round  its  muzzle, 
shouting  to  his  followers  to  overturn  it  and  so  block 
up  the  path.  The  other  gun,  firing  at  short  range 
into  the  sectaries  who  followed  him,  opened  a  passage 
for  the  troops,  who,  after  several  hours  of  struggle, 
emerged  upon  the  plain. 

Pajehu  had  learned  a  lesson,  and,  from  that  moment, 
the  Jagunfos  never  attempted  frontal  attacks  upon  their 
enemy,  but  put  in  force  the  tactics,  ten  times  more 
efficacious,  of  frontier   warfare — surprises,  ambushes. 


1 64  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

and  feints  which  kept  the  forces  of  the  Government 
always  in  alarm,  without  the  chance  of  using  their 
superior  arms.  After  five  days  of  agony,  quite  un- 
molested by  the  enemy,  tortured  by  hunger  and  by 
thirst,  footsore  and  wearied  out  with  carrying  the 
wounded,  they  reached  their  base  again.  The  popu- 
lation, who  had  expected  that  they  would  return  vic- 
torious, saw  them  march  through  the  streets  in  silence. 
Covered  with  dust,  their  arms  all  rusted,  their 
helmets,  often  replaced  by  great  straw  hats  which 
they  had  plaited  hurriedly  at  night  to  shield  them 
from  the  sun,  with  blood-stained  bandages,  unwashed, 
unshaved,  and  miserable,  they  straggled  through  the 
streets,  the  picture  of  despair.  No  discipline  was 
even  attempted  to  be  preserved,  and  the  men  marched 
in  groups  supporting  one  another,  haggard  and  war- 
worn, and  at  the  rear  followed  their  colonel,  wounded 
and  mounted  on  a  mule. 

So  finished  the  much-talked-of  expedition,  the 
second  that  had  failed  before  Canudos,  in  a  lament- 
able style.  A  cry  of  rage  ran  through  the  country, 
and  in  the  capital  ministers  were  interpolated,  and 
all  resolved,  as  soon  as  possible,  to  raise  a  force  so 
formidable  that  it  was  certain  of  success.  But,  far 
away,  deep  in  the  heart  of  the  Sertao,  after  the  long 
processions,  singing  hymns  and  carrying  banners,  had 
borne  the  dead  towards  the  cemeteries,  joy  filled  the 
hearts  of  all  the  sectaries. 

Recruits  flowed  in  from  every  side,  bringing  pro- 
visions with  them.  The  trenches  were  extended 
right  out  to  Cambaio,  and  all  the  rifles  and  the 
ammunition  which  the  troops  had  left  behind  were 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  165 

carefully  collected  and  made  fit  for  service  against  the 
next  attack.  Once  more  the  forces  of  the  "  Dog  " 
had  been  defeated,  owing  to  the  efficacy  of  the 
prophets  supplications,  for,  during  the  attack,  he  had 

7'1  uf/-^r  ^''"'^"'  ^"^"^^  "P°"  the  beams 
of  the  half-fimshed  church,  and  passed  the  time  in 

prayer.     When  he  descended  and  walked  amongst  his 

flock,  men  pressed  to  kiss  his  garment,  and  women, 

weepmg  as  he  passed,  called  down  a  blessing  from  on 

high  upon  their  Councillor. 


CHAPTER  XII 

In  Rio  de  Janeiro,  rage  and  disappointment  knew  no 
bounds,  mixed,  as  it  were,  with  a  feeling  of  amaze- 
ment that  men  undisciplined  and  badly  armed  could 
have  defeated  the  best  troops  they  had  to  send.  They 
did  not  pause  to  think  that  the  defeats  had  been  due 
more  to  the  difficulty  of  the  country  than  to  the 
rebels'  arms.  However,  worse  was  still  in  store  for 
them.  It  happened  that  the  two  defeats  that  the 
Jagun9os  had  inflicted  on  the  Government  came  at  a 
time  before  it  was  consolidated,  after  the  abdication 
of  the  Emperor.  Several  revolts  had  taken  place  in 
different  portions  of  Brazil.  At  that  time  no  one 
filled  a  greater  space  in  public  admiration  than  a 
certain  colonel  of  infantry,  one  Antonio  Moreira 
Cesar,  who  had  just  returned  from  putting  down  a 
revolution  in  the  south.  His  fame  had  gone  before 
him,  and  he  enjoyed  a  reputation  as  a  brave  but 
ferocious  soldier,  whose  hands  were  steeped  in  blood. 
Diminutive  in  stature,  with  a  weak  chest  and 
bandy  legs,  nothing  in  his  exterior  revealed  his  fever- 
ish energy.  His  face  was  pale,  but  inexpressive,  his 
forehead  high  and  bulging,  and  over  it  he  wore  a 
lock  of  hair  brought  forward  to  conceal  his  baldness. 
His  whole  appearance  was  as  that  of  a  figure  in  a 

1 66 


LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO    167 

waxwork,  and  his  slow  gestures  and  halting  speech 
completed  the  illusion  of  a  low  mentality.  Nothing 
was  farther  from  the  truth.  Brilliant  in  action,  brave 
to  temerity,  he  was  at  once  patient  and  yet  audacious 
in  conception,  a  great  endurer  of  all  hardships, 
ambitious,  revengeful,  even  to  cruelty,  but  at  the 
same  time  as  true  as  steel  towards  the  cause  he  had 
embraced. 

A  true  production  of  the  tropics,  he  passed  at  once 
from  a  cold  reserve  to  a  demoniac  fury,  having  the 
temperament  of  an  epileptic,  for  his  wild  fits  of  rage 
savoured  of  madness,  though  at  that  time  it  had  not 
yet  declared  itself.  Public  opinion  marked  him  out 
as  the  man  most  fitted  to  command  against  the 
sectaries,  and,  as  is  usually  the  case,  public  opinion 
showed  itself  favourable  to  the  worst  man  for  such  a 
post.  At  the  same  time  he  had  had  great  experience 
of  frontier  warfare,  but  in  a  field  that  differed  widely 
from  the  Sertao,  in  the  wide  prairies  of  the  south.  As 
soon  as  he  was  named  commander  of  the  expedition 
he  set  to  work  with  all  his  energy  to  choose  his 
officers  and  make  the  force  he  had  to  lead  so  formid- 
able as  to  ensure  success.  The  Government,  that 
could  not  face  another  check,  gave  him  full  power  in 
everything,  putting  the  best  troops  in  the  country  at 
his  disposition  and  sparing  no  expense.  In  an  in- 
credibly short  time  he  got  together  thirteen  hundred 
men,  all  picked  from  the  best  corps.  His  officers 
were  men  he  could  depend  upon.  Major  Raphael 
Augusto  Cunha  Mattos  commanded  the  artillery, 
which  this  time  went  well  supplied  with  ammunition, 
amply  sufficient  for  its  work.     The  infantry  was  led 


i68  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

by  Captain  Salomao  da  Rocha  ;  and  as  in  the  two 
expeditions  that  had  failed  the  want  of  cavalry  had 
been  felt  grievously,  a  squadron  under  Captain  Franco 
was  added  to  the  force.  The  State  militia,  not  great 
in  number,  but  composed  of  men  accustomed  to  the 
country  and  to  the  tactics  most  in  use  in  the  Sertao, 
was  under  the  command  of  Colonel  Tamarindo,  who, 
after  his  disastrous  retreat,  was  burning  for  revenge. 
Moreira  Cesar  staved  but  a  few  hours  in  Bahia,  and 
at  once  pushed  on  to  the  railhead  at  Queimadas, 
arriving  there  from  Rio  de  Janeiro,  with  all  his  forces, 
in  the  incredibly  short  period  of  five  days.  This 
exploit  was  to  cost  him  dearly.  Without  a  stop, 
except  to  leave  a  little  garrison  at  Queimadas,  he 
went  on  with  his  troops  to  Monte  Santo,  which  he 
had  chosen  for  his  base.  Hardly  arrived  there,  either 
owing  to  his  great  exertions,  or  because  the  disease 
long  dormant  was  now  matured  and  ready  to  break 
out,  he  was  seized  with  an  epileptic  fit.  When  he 
recovered  he  moved  on  to  Quimguingua,  a  little 
village  on  the  road.  There  a  general  council  of 
doctors  and  of  officers  was  held.  The  doctors  strongly 
advised  delay,  at  least  for  a  few  days,  to  give  Moreira 
Cesar  time  to  recover  from  the  fit. 

He  overrode  all  opposition,  and  the  day  following, 
the  3rd  of  February,  1897,  the  expedition  took  the 
road  under  conditions  more  disastrous  than  the  two 
previous  expeditions  that  had  failed. 

This  time  the  general  was  ill,  the  season  was  the 
most  unfavourable  for  military  operations  of  the  whole 
year  in  the  Sertao ;  the  heat  was  African,  the  water- 
holes  had  all  dried  up  or  were  reduced  to  mud,  and 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  169 

all  the  cattle  had  been  driven  from  the  line  of  march. 
Most  of  the  trees  had  lost  their  leaves  in  the  fierce 
heat,  a  fine,  red  dust  rose  from  the  tracks  in  clouds, 
enveloping  the  soldiers  in  its  folds,  shielding  the 
enemy's  advance,  and  making  all  the  trail  a  Calvary 
to  the  unlucky  troops. 

This  time  they  determined  to  avoid  the  road  by 
Mount  Cambaio  w^hich  had  proved  so  disastrous  to 
the  previous  expeditions,  and  after  long  deliberation, 
and  seeking  the  advice  of  local  men,  who  generally 
deceived    them    purposely    both  as    to  distances  and 
chances    of   provisions    on    the  v^ay,  they  took    the 
old  trail  that  passed  by  Cumbe,  Aracaty,  and  Rosario, 
though  it  ran  through  the  woods.     The  same  guide, 
Jesuino,   now    promoted   to  a  captaincy,   offered  his 
services    and  was    accepted  with   effusion,  after   the 
proofs   that  he  had  given  of  tried  loyalty.     As  the 
road  ran  through  woods  (caatingas)  it  offered  possi- 
bihties  of  shade  ;   but,  on  the  other  hand,  the  sappers 
had  to  open  a  path  through  the  thick  underwood, 
broad  enough  for  the  passage  of  the  troops.     Water 
was  just   as   scarce  as   on   the  other  road,  and  once 
engaged  in  the  thick  forests,  they  found  the  heat  as 
unendurable  as  on  the  open  plain.     Besides  all  this, 
the  trail  for  a  long  time  had  been  abandoned  by  the 
inhabitants.    Houses  had  been  deserted,  and  the  thick 
brushwood  of  the  tropics  had  grown  up  over  every- 
thing, obliterating  the  brief  authority  of  man.     Thus 
their   decision    was   a   leap   into   the    unknown,   and, 
after  long  deliberation  on  the  advisability  of  carrying 
water  in  hide  bags  upon  the  mules,  they  rejected  it, 
and    took    an   Artesian    field    pump,   and  a   "water 


170  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

searcher,"  who  professed  to  know  where  springs  were 
likely  to  be  found. 

By  the  road  they  saved  fifty  kilometres  in  distance  ; 
but  the  difficulties  that  they  encountered  on  the  route 
wiped  out  completely  any  advantage  that  they  had 
hoped  to  gain  by  the  shortening  of  the  track.  Pru- 
dence of  the  most  rudimentary  order  would  have 
suggested  that  they  should  secure  their  base  from  a 
surprise  attack  when  they  were  on  the  march.  As 
on  the  last  occasion,  an  over-confidence  in  ultimate 
success  blinded  them  utterly.  In  Monte  Santo,  which 
in  itself  was  open  to  attack,  and  a  poor  place  for  a 
prolonged  defence,  they  left  a  feeble  garrison  of  a  few 
dozen  soldiers  and  a  quick-firing  gun.  Then  they 
plunged  into  the  unknown,  without  a  doubt  of  their 
success,  taking  the  forest  trail. 

During  the  three  weeks  that  had  elapsed  from  the 
defeat  of  ColonelTamarindo's  expedition  to  the  launch- 
ing of  the  next  under  Moreira  Cesar,  Antonio  Consel- 
heiro  had  lost  no  time  in  strengthening  his  defences. 
The  unsuccessful  efforts  of  the  Government  had  enor- 
mously increased  his  fame.  Once  more  recruits  poured 
in  from  every  side,  and  he  was  able  easily  to  fill  the  gaps 
made  by  the  artillery  amongst  his  followers.  Extra- 
ordinary rumours  of  his  powers  soon  ran  like  wildfire, 
not  only  through  the  Sertao,  but  in  the  adjoining 
territories.  Men  told  each  other  that  angels  had  been 
seen  fighting  in  aid  of  the  good  Councillor.  Others 
there  were  who  swore  that  he  himself  had  turned 
away  the  cannon  balls  with  a  gesture  of  his  hand  and 
walked  unharmed  amongst  the  thickest  of  the  fight. 
Long  lines  of  pilgrims  once  again  toiled  along  the  trails, 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  171 

bringing  their  cattle  and  good  store  of  corn.  Maimed, 
halt,  and  paralytic  folk  carried  in  hammocks  by  their 
friends  arrived  in  numbers,  mixed  up  with  aged  men 
and  women  and  with  cattle  thieves.  All  sorts  and  all 
conditions  were  on  the  move  towards  Canudos.  Small 
cattle  farmers  had  disposed  of  their  property  to  purchase 
arms  for  both  themselves  and  for  their  cattle-peons. 
They  came  on  their  best  horses,  were  welcomed,  and 
at  once  began  to  prepare  themselves  for  the  ensuing 
fight.  Those  living  far  away,  who  for  some  reason 
or  another  could  not  come  themselves,  sent  in  long 
trains  of  mules  laden  with  corn,  jerked  beef,  with 
flour,  and  with  provisions  of  all  kinds.  The  place  was 
thoroughly  revictualled  and  the  enthusiasm  bordered 
on  frenzy,  as  fresh  contingents  daily  poured  into 
the  town.  Antonio  Conselheiro  multiplied  himself 
and  was  seen  everywhere,  encouraging  the  men  who 
dug  the  trenches,  welcoming  the  new-comers  to  his 
Zion,  and  preaching  fervently  his  doctrines  of  the 
coming  ending  of  the  world,  the  blessedness  of  suffer- 
ing, and  of  resistance  to  the  impious  Government. 

Still,  he  did  not  neglect  the  building  of  the  church, 
employing  on  it  all  those  unfit  to  go  into  the  fighting 
line — women,  and  even  children — coming  and  going 
to  overlook  their  work  whenever  he  had  time.  He 
was  determined  not  to  be  taken  by  surprise  again,  and, 
either  having  learned  by  past  experience,  or  being 
advised  by  someone  skilled  in  the  art  of  war,  he 
occupied  all  the  points  within  a  league  or  two  outside 
the  town  to  stay  the  enemy's  advance.  Spies  were 
sent  out  on  every  side,  who  penetrated  easily  into 
the  bases   of  the  Government  at  Monte    Santo    and 


172  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Queimadas,  and  sent  him  information  of  everything 
they  saw. 

This  time,  the  Jagun^os  seem  to  have  compre- 
hended the  folly  of  attacking  in  the  open  men  with 
superior  arms.  Experience  had  taught  them  that 
their  country  was  a  natural  fortress  which  they  could 
make  almost  impregnable  by  the  exercise  of  art. 
They  dug  their  trenches  so  scientifically  that  it 
seemed  almost  impossible  they  had  not  been  advised 
by  a  skilled  captain  in  the  art  of  war.  At  different 
places  on  the  defile  between  Monte  Cambaio  and  the 
town  they  erected  shelters  of  rough  stones,  leaving 
interstices  for  rifle-fire,  and  in  the  trees  at  a  con- 
venient height  they  built  low  platforms  for  sharp- 
shooters to  sit  on  and  fire  upon  the  troops.  These 
shelters,  called  in  the  patois  of  the  Sertao  "  Mutans," 
they  used  in  peace  time  for  shooting  deer,  watching 
for  tigers,  or  any  kind  of  game. 

Upon  strategic  points  in  the  defile  they  heaped 
great  rocks  ready  to  roll  on  the  invaders  as  they 
passed  below  on  the  one  trail  that  led  towards  the 
town.  In  the  great  bivouac — for  it  was  really  more  a 
bivouac  than  a  town — the  sound  of  preparations  con- 
tinued far  into  the  night,  mixed  with  the  strains  of 
hymns.  Smiths  sharpened  up  the  swords,  put  a  keen 
edge  upon  the  knives  and  bayonets,  tempered  the 
scythes  and  cattle  goads,  whilst  women  laboured 
making  cartridges.  Powder  was  scarce  ;  but  in  the 
district  sulphur  and  saltpetre  were  found  readily,  and 
charcoal  in  a  land  of  forests  was  easy  to  obtain.  The 
powder  that  they  soon  produced,  though  rough  in 
quality,  turned  out  excellent.     Thus,  when  they  had 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  173 

run  off  a  store  of  bullets,  they  were  ready  for  a  siege. 
Nothing  was  more  remarkable  than  the  frequent 
arrival  of  bandits  and  of  cattle  thieves.  They  came, 
as  they  themselves  vs^ould  have  said,  "  debaixo  do 
canga9o " — that  is,  armed  cap-a-pie.  It  does  not 
appear  that  they  w^ere  influenced  in  any  v\^ay  by  hopes 
of  plunder  or  of  gain,  for  on  arrival  they  all  submitted 
cheerfully  to  the  discipline  imposed  by  the  town 
commander,  Joao  Abbade,  who  turned  them  into 
improvised  non-commissioned  officers,  giving  them 
posts  to  hold. 

When  all  is  said,  it  is  impossible  not  to  sympathise 
to  some  extent  with  the  misguided  sectaries,  for  all 
they  wanted  was  to  live  the  life  they  had  been 
accustomed  to,  arid  sing  their  litanies.  Clearly  Antonio 
Conselheiro  had  no  views  on  any  subject  under  heaven 
outside  his  own  district.  His  dreams  were  fixed  upon 
a  better  world,  and  his  chief  care  to  fit  his  followers 
for  the  change  that  he  believed  was  to  take  place 
so  soon. 

As  usual  in  all  times  of  difficulty,  he  fell  back  on 
more  religious  ceremonies,  more  litanies,  more  self- 
abasement,  and  longer  periods  of  fasting  and  of  peni- 
tence that  he  enjoined  on  all.  His  spies  returned — 
bringing  accurate  information,  both  of  the  number 
and  the  power  of  his  foes.  So  much  they  talked  of 
the  death-dealing  guns,  the  regiments  of  well-armed 
troops,  and  of  the  terror  of  Moreira  Cesar's  name, 
that  the  simple  people  dubbed  him  "  Anti-Christ," 
thinking  he  was  the  awful  being  whom  they  heard 
so  much  about  from  their  good  Councillor.  For 
the   first  time   in   their    long    trials   their    faith    was 


174    LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 

shaken  for  a  space ;  not  that  they  feared  to  die  for  the 
cause  they  had  espoused,  but  feared  to  lose  their  Uves 
too  soon,  before  the  prophecies  that  they  had 
heard  from  Conselheiro  had  been  accomplished,  and 
thus  to  forfeit  the  kingdom  of  the  saints  that  he  had 
promised  them. 

A    great  procession   that  they   made   to   the   new 
church,   and    a  fierce   sermon  from   the   Councillor, 
promising  victory,  restored  their  spirits,  and  they  pre- 
pared themselves  to  fight,  right  to  the  bitter  end.     A 
few   deserted,    but  their   desertions  only  revived  the 
fervour  of  the  rest.     Antonio  Conselheiro   (after  his 
preparations  for  defence  were  made)   ordained  a  day 
of  prayer  and  of  humiliation.     Long  trains  of  women 
dressed  in  black  converged  upon  the  church.     The 
faithful   thronged  its  aisles.     Then,  in  dead  silence, 
he  ascended  to  the  pulpit,  and,  looking  out  upon  his 
flock,  instead  of  launching  into  a  perfervid  oration, 
bowed  his  head,  and  fixed  his  eyes  upon  the  ground 
for  a  considerable  space.    Lifting  his  head  once  more, 
he   turned   his    macerated    countenance    towards   the 
faithful,   and   in  a   broken   phrase    or   two   implored 
God's  blessing  on  them  all.     The  effect  was  magical 
and  instantaneous.      Hope    once    again    revived,    and 
with  a  shout  of  "Death  to  Anti-Christ !"  the  congre- 
gation poured  out  of  the  church  and  each  man  sought 
his  post. 


CHAPTER   XIII 

Upon  his  side  Moreira  Cesar  had  not  been  idle,  but 
had  done  all  he  could  to  get  his  troops  up  to  a 
high  state  of  efficiency.  On  the  22nd  of  February 
he  held  a  review  at  Monte  Santo,  and  found  he  had 
twelve  hundred  and  eighty  men  of  all  arms,  including 
fifty  cavalry.  Each  man  had  two  hundred  and  fifty 
cartridges  provided  for  him,  and  these  were  carried 
either  in  cartridge  belts  or  packed  up  on  the  mules. 
Besides  all  this,  a  train  of  pack-mules  and  a  few  waggons 
followed  with  the  baggage,  and  sixty  thousand  cart- 
ridges. A  battery  of  four  Krupp  guns,  commanded 
by  Captain  da  Rocha,  made  a  brave  show  at  the 
review.  Major  Raphael  Augusto  da  Cunha  Mattos  and 
Colonel  Tamarindo,  both  anxious  for  revenge  for  their 
past  reverses,  each  had  commands  they  took  up  eagerly. 

So  the  stage  was  set  for  a  minor  action  in  the  great 
drama  that  has  been  going  on  for  centuries  between 
the  old  world,  and  what  was  the  new  order,  up  to 
yesterday.  In  the  days  of  Antonio  Conselheiro,  the 
challenge  of  the  Semitico-Asiatic  hordes  had  not  been 
sounded,  and  the  security  of  life  and  property,  with 
European  marriage,  all  seemed  as  firmly  rooted  as  the 
foundations  of  the  world. 

After  the  review  was  over,  instead  of  dismissing 

175 


176  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

his  men  to  their  tents  and  bivouacs,  Moreira  Cesar 
sounded  the  advance  to  the  astonishment  of  everybody, 
and  the  whole  expedition  left  Monte  Santo  an  hour 
or  two  before  the  dark.  In  three  days  they  reached 
Cumbe,  after  a  journey  even  more  painful  than  those 
the  first  two  expeditions  had  endured.  The  full  force 
of  the  drought  now  had  reigned  for  the  whole 
summer  in  the  Sertao.  In  places  where  there  had 
been  water-holes,  none  now  were  to  be  found.  The 
trees  stood  up  gaunt  skeletons,  looking  like  sign-posts 
on  the  road  to  ruin.  The  very  birds  had  long  deserted 
the  thirst-tortured  country.  Cattle  had  all  been 
driven  off  to  better  pasturage.  Even  the  rare  wild 
beasts  that  crossed  the  column  on  the  route,  wild-cats 
and  jaguars,  were  thin  and  mangy,  and  looked  des- 
perate with  thirst.  The  soldiers  fired  at  them  in  a 
perfunctory  way,  but  failed  to  hit  them,  and  the  beasts 
appeared  to  grin  and  mock  at  them  as  they  snarled  at 
the  puffs  of  sand  the  bullets  threw  up  near  their  path. 
Only  the  lizards  seemed  at  home  and  basked  upon  the 
heated  stones  like  salamanders.  The  glare  from 
heaven  met  the  heat  ascending  from  the  parched  earth, 
and  the  soldiers  fancied  they  had  entered  purgatory. 
After  Cumbe,  hoping  to  escape  attack,  the  expedition 
this  time  left  the  forests  on  their  right,  following  the 
road  by  Cajazeiras  and  Serra  Branca  in  the  plains,  but 
passing  underneath  a  range  of  hills.  The  guides  pro- 
tested at  the  choice  of  route,  saying  it  was  the  hottest 
and  most  desolate  in  the  whole  Sertao  ;  but  Moreira 
Cesar  overruled  them,  and,  on  his  horse,  headed  the 
column  under  a  sun  that  seemed  to  petrify  the  brains. 
After  an  eight  hours'  march,  the  exhausted  men,  who 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  177 

had  not  drunk  a  drop  of  water  all  day  long,  arrived  at 
Serra  Branca.  The  General  slipped  exhausted  from 
his  horse,  that  hung  its  head,  too  tired  even  to  w^hisk 
its  tail  to  keep  the  flies  av^ay.  The  men  let  them- 
selves fall  down  in  the  ranks  and  lay,  with  their 
tongues  blackened  with  thirst,  hanging  out  of  their 
mouths,  like  dogs  after  a  long  day's  work. 

Their  first  care,  after  a  little  rest,  was  to  set  up  the 
Artesian  pump,  but,  to  their  horror,  they  discovered 
that  instead  of  packing  up  with  it  a  borer  for  the 
necessary  holes,  a  machine  for  raising  weights  had  by 
some  accident  been  substituted.  Nothing  remained 
but  to  wait  till  nightfall  brought  relief  from  the  per- 
secuting sun,  and  then  march  on  again.  Marching 
all  night,  stumbling  and  falling  in  the  darkness,  the 
men  up  to  their  knees  in  the  deep,  sandy  road,  at  last, 
just  before  daybreak,  they  reached  Rosario,  where 
there  was  a  well. 

Fevered,  and  having  passed  full  sixteen  hours 
athirst,  after  a  night  almost  as  cold  as  the  day  was 
tropical,  the  soldiers  drank  till  it  seemed  they  would 
exhaust  the  well.  Fortunately  all  South  Americans, 
whether  of  Spanish  or  Portuguese  extraction,  are 
patient  under  suffering,  and  endure  hardships  under 
which  European  troops  would  sink.  In  a  short  time, 
after  a  sleep  and  rest,  all  were  restored  to  spirits  and 
congratulated  themselves  on  having  passed  their  night 
of  misery  without  an  enemy  attack.  Fires  burned  on 
the  horizon,  and  now  and  then  during  the  night  they 
fancied  shadowy  figures  had  accompanied  the  expedi- 
tion, at  a  little  distance  from  their  ranks.  These  may 
have  been  creations  of  their  sun-heated  brains,  or  spies  of 

17 


178  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

the  Jagun90S,  who  seem  to  have  comprehended  that 
the  climate  and  the  hardships  of  the  route  were  just 
as  efficacious  aids  against  their  enemies  as  a  resort 
to  arms.  Their  system  was  apparently  to  lure  the 
soldiers  as  far  as  possible  into  their  territory,  for  the 
third  expedition  never  was  attacked  upon  the  road. 

The  soldiers'  spirits  rose,  and  a  slight  rainfall  that 
lasted  half  an  hour  refreshed  their  bodies,  so  that  they 
began  once  more  to  despise  their  enemy,  and  talk  of 
a  mere  military  promenade,  after  the  fashion  of  the 
expeditions  that  had  preceded  them  upon  their  journey 
towards  defeat.  Once  more  the  rain  descended,  this 
time  with  fury,  turning  the  roads  to  rivers  of  liquid 
mud,  and  making  all  manoeuvres  difficult.  The  order 
to  break  camp  was  given  just  at  daylight,  and,  in  the 
gloom  and  rain,  the  soldiers  struck  their  tents.  An 
alarm  was  sounded  suddenly,  but  proved  fallacious, 
and  on  the  ist  of  March  they  once  more  set  out  on 
their  way.  On  the  3rd,  they  camped  at  a  place 
called  Pitombas,  after  a  stage  of  seven  or  eight  leagues. 
The  rain  had  ceased,  and  in  an  hour  or  two  the  sun 
once  more  was  their  chief  enemy. 

Already  they  had  arrived  close  to  Canudos  without 
attack,  or  the  least  sign,  except  the  furtive  figures  in 
the  night  of  the  Jagun90s  spying  on  them.  As  they 
marched  on,  singing  in  the  ranks,  the  soldiers  talked 
of  an  easy  victory.  With  such  a  chief  as  was  Moreira 
Cesar,  all  things  were  possible.  Some  spoke  of  break- 
fasting next  day  inside  Canudos,  and  others  openly 
lamented  that  they  would  be  obliged  to  go  back 
without  a  combat  or  without  a  cartridge  spent.  From 
one  end  to  the  other  of  the  long,  straggling  line  ran 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  179 

jokes  and  gasconades,  whilst  many  wondered  why  so 
many  admirable  strategic  points  had  been  left  un- 
defended by  the  enemy.  In  fact,  once  more  they  fell 
into  the  old  mistake  of  over-confidence,  not  compre- 
hending the  tactics  of  Antonio  Conselheiro  in  lurins: 
them  into  the  lion's  den.  Just  as  they  left  Pitombas, 
to  march  on  to  the  last  stage  at  Angico  where  they 
proposed  to  camp,  a  fusillade,  from  a  belt  of  bush, 
caused  them  to  stand  to  arms.  At  the  first  iire  from 
the  unseen  enemy,  they  lost  an  officer  and  six  or  seven 
men.  Moreira  Cesar  ordered  a  halt  and  threw  out 
skirmishers.  These  advanced,  firing  into  the  bush. 
All  that  they  saw  was  the  opening  and  closing  of  the 
scrub,  as  the  Jagun9os  disappeared  into  the  woods. 

They  found  a  shot-gun  lying  on  the  ground,  and 
this  they  brought  to  their  commander  as  the  spoils  of 
victory.  Taking  it  in  one  hand,  he  fired  it  off  into 
the  air,  remarking  tranquilly,  "  Their  arms  are  quite 
inefficacious  and  little  to  be  feared."  He  little  knew 
what  was  in  store  for  him. 

The  wounded  men  he  left  in  Pitombas  with  a 
doctor  and  a  guard,  and  pushed  on  rapidly.  Instead 
of  stopping  at  Angico  to  rest  his  soldiers,  as  a  prudent 
soldier  would  have  done,  taking  full  time  to  lay  his 
plans  and  hear  his  scouts'  reports,  he  only  stayed  a 
quarter  of  an  hour.  Riding  to  the  head  of  the 
column,  he  addressed  his  men.  '*  Comrades,"  he  said, 
''  you  see  my  health  is  bad  ;  a  man  can  die  but  once  ; 
but  after  all  our  goal  Canudos  is  quite  close  to  us. 
Let  us  advance  and  capture  it  at  once." 

The  soldiers  answered  him  with  cheers.  "  Yes, 
General,"  they  cried,  "  we  will  all  follow  you.     Let 


i8o  LIFE  AND   MIRACLES  OF 

us  push  on  at  once."  After  six  hours  of  a  most 
painful  march,  they  reached  the  little  hill  called 
Mount  Favella,  and,  passing  round  it,  saw  Canudos  at 
their  feet.  Rapidly  bringing  up  a  gun,  the  artillery- 
men fired  two  rounds,  and  Moreira  Cesar,  with  a 
smile,  remarked,  "  There  go  two  visiting  cards  for 
Antonio  Conselheiro,  to  tell  him  I  am  here." 

Why,  having  four  Krupp  guns  with  him,  he  did 
not  send  a  message  to  Antonio  Conselheiro,  to  tell 
him  that  he  must  surrender,  or  have  the  place  blown 
to  pieces,  is  difficult  to  understand.  After  the  fashion 
of  the  other  commanders  of  former  expeditions,  he 
seems  to  have  grossly  undervalued  the  Jagun9os'  fight- 
ing powers.  Instead  of  opening  fire  in  a  serious  way, 
he  limited  himself  to  his  two  "  visiting  cards,"  and 
then  encamped  his  men.  It  was  the  more  extra- 
ordinary as  the  two  shots  fired,  almost  in  sport,  set  on 
fire  several  houses,  making  the  soldiers  laugh  as  they 
saw  the  inhabitants  scurrying  in  confusion  to  a  place 
of  safety  in  the  rear  of  the  great  church.  After  a 
brief  rest  in  the  encampment  that  dominated  all  the 
town,  at  one  o'clock  the  troops  advanced  to  the 
attack,  thinking  no  doubt  that  in  an  hour  they  would 
be  masters  of  the  place.  Moreira  Cesar  does  not 
seem  to  have  had  the  faintest  doubt  of  a  success.  So 
he  advanced  his  men  in  column  with  the  artillery 
upon  the  flanks,  and  marched  straight  into  the 
labyrinth  of  winding  streets  without  a  qualm,  amidst 
a  silence  of  the  tomb.  The  men  pushed  on,  their 
ranks  a  little  broken  by  the  winding  lanes,  laughing 
and  joking,  exclaiming,  as  they  found  the  houses  all 
deserted,  "  This  is  a  city  of  the  dead."     When  the 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  i8i 

last  files  had  entered  the  intricate  system  of  lanes  and 
counterlanes,  suddenly  a  hot  fire  broke  out  upon  them 
from  behind  houses,  from  rifle-pits,  artfully  covered 
up  with  palm-leaves,  and  from  the  high  walls  of  the 
unfinished  church.  From  every  side,  from  under- 
ground and  from  the  sky,  as  it  appeared,  shots  fell 
into  them,  doing  considerable  execution,  and  causing 
almost  a  panic  in  the  ranks.  Nothing  remained  but  to 
retreat  at  once  or  take  the  houses  and  dislodge  the  sharp- 
shooters, at  the  bayonet's  point.  The  soldiers,  though 
taken  by  surprise,  soon  rallied  bravely,  and  rushed  to 
the  attack.  As  they  advanced,  more  rifle-pits  were 
discovered  in  their  rear,  and  they  were  caught  between 
two  fires. 

The  winding  streets  that  often  ran  into  "dead- 
ends," causing  a  charge  to  turn  when  it  found  its  way 
barred  to  it,  soon  broke  the  attacking  force  into  small 
groups  that  advanced  upon  the  houses  and  the  rifle- 
pits,  separated  from  the  main  body  of  the  troops. 
The  artillery  was  afraid  to  fire,  for  soon  the  whole 
vast,  human  warren  was  alive  with  struggles,  in  which 
men  fought  without  the  slightest  order,  with  bayonets, 
with  rifle  butts,  and  knives.  In  the  fierce  melee,  all 
the  advantage  of  discipline  was  lost,  and  the  athletic 
Sertanejos  were  more  experienced  in  fighting  of  that 
nature  than  the  individual  soldiers  of  the  troops.  Shots 
were  fired  at  the  ranks  point  blank,  from  rifles  thrust 
through  the  interstices  of  the  rudely  built  houses,  and 
never  failed  to  find  their  mark.  Women,  wild-eyed,and 
with  their  hair  all  streaming  in  the  wind,  loaded  the  old- 
fashioned  blunderbusses  as  fast  as  they  were  emptied,  or 
brought  up  others  ready  charged  to  put  into  the  hands 


1 82  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

of  the  fierce  combatants.  They  carried  bags  of  cart- 
ridges for  the  modern  weapons,  for,  by  this  time, 
either  by  purchase  or  taken  from  the  dead  of  the  past 
expeditions,  a  number  of  good  rifles  had  fallen  into 
the  Jagun^os'  hands.  As  the  doomed  soldiers  advanced 
farther  into  the  town,  all  kinds  of  projectiles  were 
showered  upon  them :  hot  water,  stones  heated  in  the 
fire,  and  torches  made  of  rope  dipped  in  tar  fell  thickly 
on  their  heads.  When  the  troops  took  a  group  of 
houses,  not  without  serious  losses  to  themselves,  they 
tore  them  down,  only  to  find  another  group,  equally 
well  defended,  just  in  front  of  them.  During  the 
battle  psalmody  was  heard,  long  and  lugubrious,  a 
trailing  melody  of  sound,  that  made  itself  distinctly 
audible  through  all  the  firing  and  the  noise. 

The  soldiers  raised  their  heads  involuntarily,  and 
saw,  to  their  amazement,  the  prophet,  with  a  dozen  of 
his  men,  standing  on  the  walls  of  the  great  church, 
singing  their  litanies  as  composedly  as  if  no  combat 
was  in  progress  and  no  fight  was  going  on.  A  rain 
of  bullets  failed  to  reach  him,  and  the  lugubrious 
strains  were  turned  into  a  hymn  of  triumph  ;  and  still 
the  fight  surged  wildly  in  the  streets,  with  varying 
success. 

Numbers  began  to  tell,  and,  by  degrees,  the  ex- 
hausted soldiers  were  forced  back  again  towards  the 
outskirts  of  the  town.  A  prudent  leader  would  have 
sounded  a  retreat  and  started  fire  with  his  artillery. 
Moreira  Cesar,  though  a  brave  man,  experienced  in 
war,  was  rash  to  a  degree  and  over-confident.  So, 
getting  on  his  horse,  he  placed  himself  at  the  head  of 
his  small  troop  of  cavalry  to  lead  a  charge  into  the 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  183 

town.     They   did  not  number   more  than  fifty,  and 
all  their  horses  either  were  lame  or  out  of  condition 
for  a  charge,  through  dint  of  travelling.     At  a  hand 
gallop  they  advanced,  Moreira  Cesar  riding  at  their 
head  and  brandishing  his  sword.    A  brook  spread  out 
between  them  and  the  town,  and,  as  they  galloped 
down  the   slope  to  cross  its  channel,  several  of  the 
tired  and  worn-out  horses  fell,  crushing  their  riders 
and  breaking  up  the  ranks.    Just  in  the  middle  of  the 
stream  they  were  exposed  to  a  hot  fire  from  hidden 
rifle-pits.     Saddles  were  emptied,  the  charge  weakened 
and  broke,  and  then  a  panic  seized  upon  the  men,  who 
turned  to  flee,  all  in  confusion,  an  easy  target  to  the 
hidden  riflemen.      Moreira  Cesar,  mad  with  distress 
and   shame,   galloped   furiously   about,  shouting   and 
cursing  in  an  attempt  to  turn  the  fugitives.     Just  as 
he    gained    the    bank,   a    bullet    struck    him    in   the 
stomach,  and  he  dropped  his  reins,  exclaiming,  "It  is 
nothing,"  though  his  head  fell  down  upon  his  breast. 
Two  officers  spurred  to  his  side,  seeing  his  situation, 
but,  as  they  reached  him,  and  were  stretching  out 
their  hands,  a  second  bullet  hit  him,  this  time  mortally. 
Still  he  remained  upon  his  horse,  supported  on  each 
side  by  his  two  officers,  who  brought  him,  still  seated 
half-unconscious  in  the  saddle,  back  to  the  encamp- 
ment that  he  so  recently  had  left. 

The  command  devolved  on  Colonel  Tamarindo, 
who,  with  more  prudence  than  his  chief,  set  about 
instantly  to  disengage  his  forces  from  the  town,  and 
to  re-form  his  scattered  companies  under  the  fire  of 
the  artillery. 

Night   was  just  falling   as    the   troops  slowly   dis- 


1 84     LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 

engaged  themselves  out  of  the  labyrinth.  The 
Angelus  rang  out,  and,  as  it  sounded  in  the  now 
silent  air,  the  fierce  Jagun9os  threw  their  leather  hats 
upon  the  ground,  crossed  themselves  piously,  and, 
falling  on  their  knees,  prayed  fervently,  thanking  the 
God  of  Battles,  who,  at  the  intercession  of  their 
Councillor,  had  sent  them  victory. 


CHAPTER    XIV 

When  at  last  Colonel  Tamarindo  had  withdrawn  his 
troops  out  of  the  hornet's  nest  into  which  the  rashness 
of  their  late  chief  had  plunged  them,  he  fell  back 
upon  his  guns.  By  this  time  all  the  ranks  were 
broken,  and  though  the  troops  had  inflicted  heavy 
losses  on  the  enemy,  their  own,  in  ratio  to  their 
numbers,  were  still  heavier.  The  little  hill  on  which 
the  guns  were  placed  was  too  close  to  the  town  for 
them  to  stay  there,  for  fear  of  a  surprise.  Therefore, 
in  a  confused  and  mixed-up  mass,  they  retreated  to  a 
higher  hill  called  Alto  do  Mario,  four  or  five  hundred 
yards  away.  There  they  encamped  in  a  roughly 
formed  square,  with  their  artillery  and  baggage  animals 
inside  of  it.  As  several  hours  of  light  remained,  why 
they  did  not  at  once  reduce  the  town  to  ruins  with 
their  four  Krupp  guns  has  never  been  explained. 

Moreira  Cesar,  though  rash  and  ill-advised,  was 
above  all  a  man  of  energy.  Had  he  been  fit  to  take 
the  leadership,  all  yet  might  have  been  saved,  and 
discipline  once  more  established  in  the  ranks.  His 
successor.  Colonel  Tamarindo,  although  a  man  accus- 
tomed to  adventures  from  his  youth,  and  trained  in 
frontier  fighting,  broken  to  hardships,  and  a  brave 
officer,  was  yet  a  fatalist.     Perhaps  disheartened  by 

185 


1 86  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

his  previous  defeat,  or  from  his  age,  for  he  had  long 
passed  sixty,  he  had  set  out  upon  the  expedition  quite 
against  his  will.  From  the  first  day  he  had  been 
melancholy,  and  now,  just  at  the  moment  when  he 
had  to  take  command,  he  fell  into  a  fit  of  stupor,  and, 
sitting  down  upon  a  box,  rested  his  head  between  his 
hands.  Nothing  could  move  him  from  his  lethargy. 
To  the  officers  who  came  to  him  to  ask  instructions 
all  he  would  reply  was,  ""Do  the  best  you  can  under 
the  circumstances."  This  attitude  completed  their 
discouragement.  It  was  the  moment  for  a  man  of 
spirit  to  curse  a  little,  to  pray  a  little,  to  talk  of 
honour  and  of  home,  of  sweethearts  and  of  wives  ;  to 
strike  some,  half  in  anger,  half  playfully  with  the  flat 
of  his  sword,  to  encourage  falterers  with  a  brave 
word,  to  curb  the  headstrong,  and  by  example,  bring 
back  courage  into  their  hearts  and  order  to  the  ranks. 
Poor  Colonel  Tamarindo  was  not  the  man  for  the 
plight  in  which  they  found  themselves.  His  ofiBcers 
must  have  thought  with  regret  upon  their  rash  but 
energetic  chief,  mortally  wounded,  lying  helpless  in 
an  old  ruined  house  called  "  A  Fazenda  Velha,"  in 
the  middle  of  the  square. 

Night  fell  upon  the  beaten  and  discouraged  men, 
as  it  so  often  falls  in  the  Sertao,  starlit  and  silent.  The 
stars  shone  out  like  moons  in  the  clear  atmosphere, 
and  just  above  Canudos,  the  Southern  Cross  rose 
slowly  till  it  appeared  to  be  on  watch  above  the  city 
of  the  Councillor.  Every  few  minutes  flashes  of 
summer  lightning  illuminated  everything,  making  the 
night  still  more  mysterious  in  the  interval.  Frogs 
croaked  with  a  metallic  note,  cicalas  chirped,  and  in 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  187 

the  scanty  bushes  on  the  river  bank  myriads  of  fire- 
flies, looking  like  a  shower  of  golden  spangles,  twinkled 
and  darted  to  and  fro.  Such  nights  appear  to  bring 
the  soul  into  more  intimate  connection  with  the  spirit 
of  Nature,  and  lift  it  out  of  the  region  of  mere  selfish 
yearnings  to  be  one  with  God,  for  its  own  welfare, 
into  communion,  not  only  with  the  Deity,  but  with 
all  that  He  has  made. 

Little  enough  did  the  disorganised  mass  of  soldiery 
think  of  such  matters,  and  their  immediate  care  was 
for  their  lives.  A  hurried  council  of  the  chief  officers 
was  held  by  the  camp  fire,  and  after  short  delibera- 
tions they  agreed  to  acquaint  their  dying  leader  that 
they  had  resolved  upon  retreat.  A  captain  was  de- 
puted to  convey  the  news  to  him  as  he  lay  with  his 
head  upon  a  saddle,  wrapped  in  his  military  cloak. 
Though  he  had  but  a  few  more  hours  of  life,  his  head 
was  clear,  clearer  perhaps  than  it  had  been  throughout 
the  course  of  the  disastrous  expedition,  and  his  resolu- 
tion fixed  and  unchangeable.  He  heard  the  message 
with  amazement.  Then  raising  himself  on  one  elbow, 
pale,  and  with  the  dews  of  death  upon  his  hair,  but 
resolute  and  energetic  to  the  last,  in  a  clear  voice  he 
gave  his  reasons  against  their  policy. 

*'  We  have,"  he  said,  '*  seven  or  eight  hundred 
soldiers  still  remaining,  all  armed  and  well-supplied 
with  ammunition.  It  is  your  duty  to  restore  disci- 
pline amongst  them,  and  this  once  done,  there  are 
enough  of  them  to  carry  on  the  fight.  Our  position 
here  is  good,  for  with  our  guns  we  dominate  the 
town.  Attack  it  boldly  and  it  will  be  yours."  From 
reasoning  he  passed  on  to  reproach,  to  fury,  and  to 


1 88  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

despair,  but  could  not  put  his  courage  and  his  resolu- 
tion into  hearts  dead  to  shame.  Then  he  gave  his 
last  order.  "  This  retreat  is  not  to  be  begun."  This 
did  not  move  them.  So,  calling  for  his  secretary,  he 
dictated  to  him  his  last  dispatch,  telling  the  Govern- 
ment of  all  that  he  had  done.  Lastly,  broken  by  fast 
approaching  death  and  shame  at  the  retreat  that  he 
saw  would  be  begun  as  soon  as  he  no  longer  had  the 
power  to  give  an  order  or  protest,  in  his  own  hand  he 
wrote  upon  the  margin  of  the  document,  "  I  retire 
from  the  army."  Then  sinking  back  upon  the  ground, 
he  wrapped  his  head  up  in  his  cloak,  and  in  a  few 
hours  passed  away  without  a  word. 

His  death  completed  the  confusion  and  despair  of 
his  discouraged  troops.  In  addition  to  the  difficulties 
of  their  position  and  to  the  distance  that  they  had  to 
go  before  they  possibly  could  reach  a  place  of  safety, 
a  wave  of  superstition  now  swept  over  all  of  them. 
The  over-confidence  with  which  they  had  set  out, 
and  the  ill-judged  contempt  of  an  enemy  not  to  be 
despised,  had  given  way  to  a  blind  terror  of  him. 
The  soldiers  all  came  from  the  northern  provinces, 
and  in  essentials,  though  with  a  tinge  of  negro  blood, 
were  of  the  same  race  as  their  enemies.  The  name 
of  Antonio  Conselheiro  was  familiar  to  them.  Most 
likely  all  had  heard  of,  and  some  believed  in,  his  super- 
natural powers.  Amongst  the  ranks  there  was  no 
stiffening  of  better  educated  men  from  near  the 
capital.  The  energetic  Paulistas*  were  conspicuous 
by  their  absence,  and  none  of  the  Rio  Grande  men, 
themselves  half  Gauchos,  and  accustomed  to  inter- 
*  Men  from  Sao  Paulo. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  189 

course  with  the  materialistic  Gauchos  of  Uruguay 
and  of  the  Argentine,  were  there  to  mock  their  fears. 
Wild  stories  circulated  about  Antonio  Conselheiro's 
powers.  He  had  been  seen,  alone,  high  on  the  church, 
catching  the  bullets  in  his  hands,  and  dropping  them 
upon  the  ground.  All  that  had  happened  seemed 
inexplicable  to  the  superstitious  soldiers,  and  most  of 
all,  the  defeat  and  death  of  their  commander,  whom 
they  all  looked  on  as  invincible.  At  midnight  the 
whole  camp  was  thrown  into  alarm.  The  sentinels 
and  scouts  came  in,  firing  their  rifles  as  they  ran.  Up 
from  Canudos,  buried  in  the  depths  of  darkness,  came 
a  sound  of  many  voices,  a  hum  as  of  advancing  thou- 
sands, so  it  appeared  to  them.  They  stood  to  arms, 
and  listened,  then  their  vain  terrors  were  accentuated, 
for  it  was  not  the  sound  of  an  advancing  host  that  had 
alarmed  them,  but  a  universal  prayer.  Women  and 
men  and  children,  old  and  young,  combatants  and 
non-combatants  alike,  were  praying  fervently,  led  by 
the  prophet  from  the  highest  point  of  vantage  on  the 
half-finished  church. 

It  was  a  sound  that  must  to  anyone  have  seemed 
mysterious,  even  terrifying.  A  town  of  possibly  some 
twenty  thousand  souls  all  praying  with  one  voice  and 
one  accord,  out  of  the  darkness  of  the  night.  To  the 
half-beaten,  wholly  shaken  soldiery  grouped  listening 
on  the  hill,  it  sent  a  thrill  of  superstitious  terror  that 
penetrated  to  their  souls.  Victory  was  still  within 
their  grasp  had  they  but  known  it,  or  had  a  particle 
of  the  energy  of  poor  Moreira  Cesar,  now  lying  dead, 
wrapped  in  his  military  cloak — the  fittest  winding 
sheet  of  a  brave  soldier — possessed  their  officers.   Their 


I90  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

strength  was  in  the  guns  that  they  had  failed  to  use, 
and  by  whose  aid  the  wretched  village  at  their  feet 
was  dominated.  No  weapons  can  give  courage  to  a 
coward,  and  in  their  case  the  ancient  Spanish  saying, 
"Weighed  down  with  iron,  weighed  down  with  fear"* 
was  amply  verified. 

The  first  faint  streaks  of  dawn  saw  them  all  ready 
for  the  road.  Their  leader.  Colonel  Tamarindo,  now 
in  some  part  emerged  from  the  stupor  that  had  over- 
whelmed him,  had  the  sense  left  to  marshal  all  his 
men  into  some  sort  of  order  for  their  arduous  retreat. 
The  first  to  leave  the  ground  was  a  detachment  of  the 
best  troops,  and  what  remained  of  the  defeated  cavalry. 
These  he  threw  out  upon  his  wings  to  act  as  scouts  ; 
but  the  disabled  condition  of  their  horses  that  had 
passed  a  night  deprived  of  water  and  of  food  detracted 
from  their  use. 

Then  came  the  vanguard,  escorting  all  the  baggage 
animals,  and  with  the  wounded  carried  in  litters, 
roughly  improvised  ;  then,  wrapped  in  a  hide,  the 
body  of  their  leader,  lashed  upon  a  mule.  Lastly 
came  half  of  the  artillery,  for  they  had  left  two  of 
their  guns  under  a  subaltern  upon  the  hill  on  which 
the  camp  had  been  erected,  with  orders  to  delay  the 
enemy's  advance  at  any  cost. 

This  he  did  bravely,  for  at  the  moment  that  the 
last  files  of  the  retreating  troops  left  the  encampment, 
he  was  attacked  on  every  side.  A  bell  on  the  great 
church  called  everyone  to  arms  down  in  Canudos,  and 
from  all  sides  a  hot  discharge  broke  on  the  brave 
young  ofiicer  and  his  artillerymen.  When  he  judged 
*  "  Cargado  de  hierro,  cargado  de  miedo." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  191 

that  his  comrades  had  begun  their  march  in  safety, 
and  after  having  killed  almost  a  hundred  of  the  enemy, 
he  withdrew  his  guns,  retreating  in  good  order,  after 
the  retiring  force.  Had  he  but  stayed  and  turned  his 
guns  upon  the  town,  the  whole  result  of  the  disastrous 
expedition  might  have  been  altered;  but  it  was  WTitten 
otherwise  in  the  great  book  of  human  folly  which  so 
many  take  for  fate. 

When  the  day  broke,  it  showed  the  column  on  the 
march,  still  in  good  order,  but  outflanked  on  every 
side  by  the  Jagun9os,  who  from  the  points  of  vantage 
on  the  road  poured  in  a  galling  fire.  Still  there  was 
nothing  in  their  situation  that  an  energetic  leader 
could  not  have  coped  with,  had  but  some  discipline 
been  kept,  and  the  most  elementary  knowledge  of 
conducting  a  retreat  existed  anywhere.  Once  clear  of 
the  defiles,  and  in  the  plains,  they  might  have  camped 
beside  a  river,  grazed  their  pack  animals  under  a 
guard,  whilst  the  artillery  held  back  the  enemy  till 
all  were  rested,  and  an  orderly  retreat  was  entered  on. 
This  by  degrees  would  have  brought  them  all  to 
safety,  for  the  Jaguncos  never  ventured  far  from  their 
own  territory. 

Nothing  was  farther  from  the  minds  of  the  mulatto 
soldiers  than  to  make  a  stand.  Their  comrades  were 
falling  in  the  ranks  at  every  volley  the  Jaguncos  fired. 
Only  the  artillery  bringing  up  the  rear  resisted,  firing 
bravely  into  the  thick  ranks  of  the  pursuing  sectaries. 
Little  by  little  the  artillerymen  were  picked  off  by  the 
sharpshooters,  falling  beside  their  guns.  They  all  fell 
bravely,  with  their  faces  to  the  foe. 

Their  fate,  and  the  reluctance  of  the  Jagun9os  to 


192  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

close  in  upon  them,  shows  clearly  what  might  have 
been  accomplished,  had  but  the  rest  of  the  retreating 
expedition  shown  ordinary  nerve.       At  last  the  catas- 
trophe   burst   on   the   retreating    horde.     The   guns, 
which  had  been  dragged  by  mules,  stopped  suddenly 
at  a  corner  of  the  road  before  the  retreating  expedition 
had  disengaged  itself  from  the  defile  below  Monte 
Cambaio.      Colonel  Tamarindo,  who  since  the  break 
of  day  had  manifested  an  energy  and  a  courage   in 
inverse  ratio  to   his   weakness  of   the   night    before, 
exposed  his  life  recklessly,  galloping  fearlessly  from 
one  end  of  the  column  to  the  other,  trying  to  infuse 
some  spirit  in  his  men.     His  efforts  all  were  useless, 
and  the  last  artillerymen  were  slaughtered  round  their 
guns.     With  shouts  of  triumph  the  Jagun9os  closed 
in,  with  overwhelming  '^^^'^ibers  on  the  column.     It 
made  but  slight  resistance;  but  abandoning  the  baggage 
animals,  leaving  the  body  of  Moreira  Cesar  on  the 
ground,  all  broke  into  a  mad  flight.     Knapsacks  and 
guns  were  cast  away.     Bayonets  and  cartridge  cases, 
blankets  and  greatcoats  littered  the  road  on  every  side. 
Like   vultures  the   Jagunfos  swooped    down   on  the 
deserted  guns,  cutting  down  Capitan  Salomao  and  four 
brave  artillerymen,  who  remained  faithful  to  the  end. 
Colonel  Tamarindo,  left  alone,  still  tried  to  stay  the 
tide  of  fugitives,  displaying  a  courage  and  contempt  of 
death  which  he  had  brought  too  late  into  the  field. 
As  he  was  galloping,  waving  his  sword  and  shouting 
orders  to  the  flying  men,  a  bullet  struck  him  in  the 
breast.      He  fell,  half  dying,  and  to  an  oflicer  who 
galloped  up  to  him  gave  his  last  order  with  his  failing 
breath,     "  I  leave  the  command  to  Colonel  Cunha 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  193 

Mattos  " ;  then  he  rolled  between  the  feet  of  his 
expiring  horse,  that,  pierced  with  twenty  bullets,  had 
staggered  up  against  a  rock. 

The  expedition,  which  such  a  little  time  ago  had 
left  its  base  well-armed  and  well-provisioned,  confident 
of  success,  marching  to  the  sound  of  bugle  and  ot 
drum,  had  disappeared.  All  that  remained  was  a  mere 
mob  of  fugitives.  Eight  hundred  men,  without  pro- 
visions, defenceless,  burning  with  thirst,  helpless  and 
deprived  of  guides,  were  left  like  shipwrecked 
mariners  tossed  without  compass  on  the  sea.  Many 
who  left  the  roads  soon  lost  their  way,  and  perished 
in  the  woods  of  hunger  and  of  thirst.  About  five 
hundred  kept  together,  unpursued,  for  the  Jagun9os 
were  occupied  in  dragging  back  the  guns,  in  hunting 
up  the  mules  laden  with  ammunition  and  provisions, 
and  in  picking  up  the  rifles,  bayonets,  and  arms  that 
they  found  strewn  upon  the  ground.  The  store  of 
ammunition  which  Moreira  Cesar  had  left  behind  at 
O  Rosario  all  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  triumphant 
sectaries,  who  thus  were  able  to  equip  the  front  ranks 
of  their  fighting  line  with  better  weapons,  which 
they  used  with  considerable  effect  against  their 
enemies. 

After  three  days  of  agonising  flight,  in  which 
men  dropped  upon  the  sand  and  died  at  every 
turning  of  the  road,  the  main  group  of  the  fugitives 
reached  Monte  Santo  unpursued,  except  by  their  own 
fears.  What  they  underwent  upon  the  road,  without 
provisions,  in  the  full  rigour  of  the  summer,  forced  to 
struggle  on  continuously,  or  else  to  die  of  thirst,  can 
be    more    easily    imagined    than    described.     In   the 

13 


194  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

striking  phrase  of  Euclydes  da  Cunha,*  which  in 
itself  was  taken  from  the  Jagun9os,  *'  the  forces  of  the 
Government  had  become  a  weakness/'-f-  for  the  time 
being,  at  the  least.  All  the  result  of  the  expedition, 
under  the  much  vaunted  leader,  Moreira  Cesar,  had 
been  to  equip  the  Jagun9os  for  the  first  time  with 
artillery,  and  with  a  plentiful  supply  of  arms.  It  had 
also  stimulated  their  fanaticism,  and  raised  the  prestige 
of  Antonio  Conselheiro  to  an  unprecedented  height. 
His  followers  looked  on  their  victory  as  a  miracle 
brought  about  by  his  prayers.  They  had  seen  the 
forces  of  the  Government  arrive  before  Canudos,  at 
the  first  fire  of  the  artillery  set  several  houses  burning, 
and  had  given  themselves  up  for  lost.  Then,  without 
apparent  reason,  they  had  seen  the  same  forces,  still 
unbroken,  still  with  their  formidable  artillery  covering 
their  retreat,  retire  and  break  into  disorder,  then  turn 
into  a  rabble  and  throw  their  arms  upon  the  ground. 
What  wonder  that  to  ignorant  and  superstitious  men 
it  seemed  a  miracle  ? 

Their  unlooked-for  victory  seems  to  have  stirred  up 
in  their  minds  instincts  that  perhaps  they  owed  to 
their  remotest  ancestors  in  Africa,  or  to  the  Tupi 
Indians,  whose  blood  flowed  in  the  veins  of  many  of 
them.  After  the  battle  and  the  collecting  of  the 
arms,  they  next  turned  their  attention  to  the  dead. 
These  they  decapitated,  and  burned  the  bodies  in 
great  piles.  The  heads  they  placed  on  stakes  on  each 
side    of    the    defile    between    Canudos    and     Mount 

*  «  Os  Sertoes." 

t  A  play  upon  the  words  "  forf a,"  force,  and  "fraqueza," 
weakness. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  195 

Cambaiao,  just  as  the  Ashantis  had  an  avenue  of  heads 
before  their  capital.  Above  each  head,  upon  the 
trees  and  bushes,  was  hung  a  knapsack,  a  jacket, 
or  a  kepi,  a  belt,  a  saddle,  or  a  military  cloak,  so 
that  the  whole  road  seemed  a  rag-fair,  of  death. 

Lastly,  impaled  and  standing  upright,  shrivelled  to 
a  mummy  in  the  dry  air  of  the  Sertao,  they  stuck  the 
body  of  Colonel  Tamarindo,  as  if  he  still  commanded 
his  unlucky  men,  placing  it  only  a  yard  or  two  from 
where  he  fell.  His  horse,  mortally  wounded,  had 
staggered  a  few  paces  farther  on  before  it  died  upon 
its  feet,  resting  against  a  bank.  The  Jagun^os  left  it 
where  it  had  finished  its  career,  and  the  dry  climate 
desiccated  it,  so  that  months  afterwards,  when  a  new 
expedition  passed  through  the  defile,  it  was  still  per- 
fect, undecayed  and  dry,  with  the  wind  lifting  up 
its  mane  occasionally — a  veritable  pale  horse  of 
death,  descended  lineally  from  its  prototype  in  the 
Apocalypse. 


CHAPTER  XV 

For  the  third  time  the  forces  of  the  Government  had 
suffered  a  reverse,  at  the  hands  of  men  undiscipHned, 
ill-armed,  and  aided  chiefly  by  the  difficulties  of  the 
country  where  they  lived.  There  was  no  compromise 
possible  to  be  arrived  at  between  the  forces  that  were 
engaged.  The  Government  could  not  afford  to  treat 
in  any  way  with  Antonio  Conselheiro,  for  they  had 
nothing  in  their  power  to  offer  him.  He  on  his  side, 
most  likely,  would  never  have  consented  to  hold  a 
parley  with  the  entity  that  he  had  typified  as  Anti- 
Christ. 

The  blow  that  the  Government  had  received  was 
grievous  to  its  prestige,  unstable  as  it  was,  with  several 
revolutions  on  its  hands.  Still,  they  were  not  so 
serious  as  the  movement  in  the  Sertao,  as  they  were 
of  the  kind  common  in  South  America,  raised  by 
ambitious  men.  Had  any  of  them  triumphed,  one 
Government  would  have  succeeded  another,  very  like 
the  last.  Antonio  Conselheiro,  with  his  millenniary 
doctrine,  challenged,  even  if  he  was  unaware  of  it 
himself,  all  the  foundations  of  society.  No  challenge 
is  so  fatal  to  any  system  as  to  predict  its  speedy 
ending,  for  at  once  the  state  of  things  so  challenged 
becomes  of  no  account  to  the  believers  in  the  prophecy. 

196 


LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO     197 

Antonio  Conselheiro  probably  had  no  very  definite 
ideas  either  of  his  own  position  or  of  the  power  of  the 
Government,  His  late  success  does  not  appear  to  have 
elated  him  unduly,  nor  did  he  seem  to  have  conceived 
any  ideas  of  conquest  beyond  the  limits  of  the 
Sertao. 

Had  he  been  let  alone,  it  is  probable  that  things 
would  have  gone  on  quite  quietly,  for  his  doctrines 
seem  to  have  been  quite  fitted  to  his  followers.  There 
being  no  accommodation  possible  between  a  Govern- 
ment that  held  the  usual  comfortable  doctrine  that 
to-morrow  will  be  the  same  as  yesterday,  and  heralded 
all  change  as  progress,  being  quite  positive  that  they 
were  the  repository  of  all  wisdom  and  all  common 
sense,  and  on  the  other  hand  a  prophet  who  esteemed 
all  worldly  wisdom  a  mere  tinkling  cymbal,  nothing 
was  left  but  to  fight  out  the  question  to  the  end.  This 
was  what  both  sides  were  prepared  to  do. 

The  Government  assembled  in  Bahia  a  force  of  some 
five  thousand  men,  with  field  and  siege  artillery,  half 
a  regiment  of  cavalry  from  Rio  Grande  do  Sul,  com- 
posed of  Gauchos,  the  whole  under  the  command  of 
General  Arthur  Oscar  de  Andrade  Guimaraens,  an 
officer  of  considerable  renown. 

Once  more  the  vainglorious  and  foolish  over- 
confidence  that  had  proved  so  disastrous  to  the  three 
previous  expeditions  overtook  the  fourth.  The 
General's  orders  were  to  lose  as  little  time  as  possible 
in  Bahia,  but  to  push  on  at  once  to  the  railhead  at 
Queimadas,  and  there  establish  a  provisional  base  of 
operations,  and  await  the  arrival  of  more  troops.  This 
he  was  forced  to  do,  even  more  speedily  than  he  had 


198  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

bargained  for,  by  the  foolish  conduct  of  his  officers 
and  men. 

The  officers,  mostly  cadets,  just  through  the  military 
schools,  who  probably  had  never  left  the  capital,  saw 
in  Bahia  only  an  advanced  post  of  the  Sertao.  The 
winding  streets  and  high  colonial  houses  with  their 
red-tiled  roofs,  the  wealth  of  convents  and  of  churches, 
dark  passages  and  massive  doors  with  coats-of-arms 
cut  deeply  over  them,  only  appeared  to  the  young 
men  as  vestiges  of  barbarism.  They  went  about, 
clanking  their  sabres,  trailing  their  useless  spurs  upon 
the  pavements,  and  going  on  as  if  they  were  in  occu- 
pation of  a  conquered  territory.  They  all  affiscted  to 
perceive  in  the  revolt  of  the  Jagun9os  a  movement  to 
restore  the  monarchy.  Hardly  a  day  passed  without 
some  disagreeable  incident,  or  some  collision  with  the 
civil  population,  who  were  as  much  opposed  to 
Antonio  Conselheiro  as  were  the  officers  themselves. 

The  General  was  obliged  to  issue  orders  that  the 
troops  should  entrain  for  Queimadas,  straight  from  the 
harbour,  so  that  in  a  few  days,  after  having  left  a  dis- 
agreeable feeling  in  Bahia,  all  were  assembled  at  the 
railhead,  and  marched  on  without  delay  to  Monte 
Santo,  which  as  before  was  chosen  for  the  base. 

Antonio  Conselheiro  seems  to  have  had  little  or  no 
illusions  as  to  the  fate  reserved  for  him  and  for  the 
Zion  of  his  followers,  in  the  face  of  such  a  formidable 
force.  Nevertheless,  he  made  all  preparations  for  a 
desperate  defence.  The  great  new  church  was  almost 
finished  by  this  time.  On  it  he  mounted  two  of  the 
Krupp  guns  taken  from  the  third  expedition.  The 
other  two  he  placed  in  strategic  positions  to  guard  the 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  199 

approaches  to  the  town.  People  still  flowed  towards 
Canudos,  bringing  provisions  with  them,  and  the 
whole  country  to  his  rear  was  open  to  him,  and  in 
the  main  favourable  to  his  cause.  He  now  disposed 
of  a  certain  quantity  of  modern  rifles  and  a  good 
store  of  ammunition  for  them. 

The  spiritual  appeal  he  in  nowise  neglected,  preach- 
ing incessantly,  enjoining  even  more  rigorous  fasting 
and  penitence,  prophesying  the  final  judgment,  after 
the  reign  of  Don  Sebastian  upon  earth.  Whether 
the  leaders  who  were  steeped  in  crime,  as  Pajehii  and 
Macambira,  believed  in,  or  even  cared  about  the 
coming  of  an  illusory  King  to  reign  in  glory  and  to 
judge  the  world  previous  to  its  destruction,  is  a  moot 
point,  for  who  shall  dive  into  the  mysteries  of  the 
human  mind  or  search  its  folhes  ?  Perhaps  they  had 
a  vague  belief,  or  were  impressed  by  Antonio  Consel- 
heiro,  accustomed  as  they  all  were  to  the  outward 
forms  of  the  Catholic  religion  from  their  infancy. 
Most  likely  they  felt  rather  than  reasoned  out  that 
the  wild  life  in  the  Sertao  would  be  ended  if  the 
Government  should  conquer,  and  they  themselves 
subjected  to  the  law.  At  any  rate,  they  gave  un- 
questioning obedience  to  their  leader,  and  did  their 
utmost  to  prepare  for  the  death-struggle  that  awaited 
them. 

Upon  the  other  side,  the  railhead  at  Queimadas 
rang  with  the  din  of  preparations.  A  great  instruc- 
tion camp  was  formed,  and  on  its  parade-ground  the 
soldiers  trained  incessantly,  practising  such  evolutions 
as  appeared  best  suited  to  a  campaign  in  the  Sertao. 
Warned  by  experience,  the  General  had  a  regiment  of 


200  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

scouts  dressed  in  the  leather  clothes  of  the  Jagun90s, 
making  it  possible  for  them  to  manoeuvre  in  the  bush. 
The  body  of  the  troops,  unluckily  for  them,  still  kept 
their  gaudy  uniforms,  rendering  them  an  easy  mark 
for  the  sharpshooters  who  annoyed  them  on  the  march. 
Two  months  were  thus  consumed  in  preparations,  giving 
the  soldiers  time  to  become  discontented  with  their 
monotonous  surroundings,  and  in  some  degree  infected 
by  the  inhabitants  with  a  vague  terror  of  the  enemy. 
The  rank-and-file  were  almost  all  men  drawn  from  the 
northern  provinces,  accustomed  from  their  earliest 
years  to  hear  of  miracles  performed  by  various 
impostors,  or  self-deceivers,  who  from  time  to  time 
appeared.  Most  likely  many  of  them  saw  nothing 
improbable  in  the  coming  of  the  King,  Don  Sebastian, 
to  reign  upon  the  earth.  By  race  and  training,  and  by 
the  ties  of  superstition  and  of  faith,  they  were  not  far 
removed  from  the  Jagun9os  whom  they  were  called 
upon  to  fight.  Their  discontent  was  rendered  more 
acute  by  scarcity  of  food,  for  the  commissariat,  hastily 
organised  and  badly  planned,  had  proved  a  failure. 
Flour  soon  was  finished,  and  the  troops  depended  for 
their  food  upon  the  thin  cattle  which  were  driven 
down  to  them  through  grassless  districts,  arriving 
famishing  and  travel-worn. 

The  situation  in  Queimadas  was  disastrous.  The 
armies  of  the  republic,  but  just  emerged  from  a  long 
revolutionary  struggle,  were  in  confusion.  Only  a 
single  line  existed  to  the  coast.  By  it  the  troops,  the 
ammunition  and  provisions,  all  filtered  slowly  up 
towards  the  base.  When  regiments  arrived,  the 
greater  part  of  them  were  far  below  their  strength 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  201 

on  paper,  and  half  were  raw  recruits.  Orders  were 
sent  from  Rio  de  Janeiro  to  march  at  once,  and  to 
secure  success  if  possible ;  for  the  Government  had 
suffered  seriously  by  the  three  previous  blows.  The 
General,  Arthur  Oscar,  adopted  a  plan  for  his  attack 
almost  precisely  similar  to  that  adopted  by  Moreira 
Cesar,  with  the  exception  that  his  forces  were  far 
larger  and  his  artillery  much  more  formidable.  Two 
columns,  one  under  General  Silva  Barbosa,  and  the 
other  commanded  by  General  Savaget,  were  to  con- 
verge upon  the  town.  Given  the  circumstances  and 
the  nature  of  the  country,  it  is  difficult  to  see  what 
other  plan  could  have  been  hit  upon.  To  make 
things  more  secure  General  Arthur  Oscar  added  a 
third  column  to  attack  Canudos  in  the  rear.  Pushed 
by  the  Government,  and  compelled  to  make  a  show  of 
great  activity,  he  sent  off  General  Savaget,  early  in 
April,  with  a  column,  by  the  Joazeiro- Villa  Nova 
road.  He  himself  was  detained,  by  the  need  to  train 
his  raw  recruits,  by  shortness  of  provisions  and  by  the 
lack  of  ammunition  for  his  guns,  until  the  end  of 
June.  During  this  interval  the  discontent  amongst 
the  troops  at  the  inaction  and  the  want  of  food 
became  so  great,  that  in  order  to  appease  it  a 
hypothetical  reconnaissance  was  undertaken  towards 
the  insurgents'  outworks  at  the  strategic  points.  This 
expedient,  so  well  known  to  leaders  in  a  like  position, 
nearly  ended  in  a  catastrophe,  owing  to  the  rashness 
of  Colonel  Thompson  Flores,  the  colonel  in  command. 
This  officer,  unused  to  frontier  warfare,  and  jealous 
of  the  luck,  as  he  considered  it,  of  General  Savaget, 
who  he  imagined  would  take  Canudos  with  a  rush, 


202  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

determined  to  push  on,  and  to  win  laurels  on  his  own 
account.  Only  an  urgent  dispatch  from  headquarters 
saved  him  from  rushing  on  his  fate.  Nothing  appears 
to  have  served  as  a  lesson  sharp  enough  to  make  the 
Brazilian  national  troops  aware  of  the  great  difficulties 
of  a  campaign  in  the  Sertao.  They  all  appeared  to 
think  that  in  the  familiar  Spanish  phrase,  *'  They 
could  arrive  and  kiss  the  saint,"*  unaware,  perhaps, 
that  the  twin  paths  that  lead  to  heaven  and  glory  are 
arduous  to  tread. 

Towards  the  end  of  June  (1897)  General  Arthur 
Oscar  gave  the  signal  to  depart.  The  ill-trained, 
half-starved  troops  plunged  into  the  wilderness  upon 
half  rations — not  a  good  preparation  for  a  difficult 
campaign.  With  them  they  took  a  large  siege  gun,  a 
Whitworth,  that  weighed  nearly  two  thousand  pounds. -f* 
This  piece  of  ordnance  put  the  expedition  to  great 
trouble,  for  transport  animals  were  scarce,  roads  were 
non-existent,  and  in  the  month  of  June  such  tracks  as 
did  exist  were  ankle-deep  in  mud.  The  General  seems 
to  have  imagined  that  he  had  to  embark  upon  a  semi- 
European  style  of  warfare,  and  so  annoyed  his  troops 
with  a  strict  discipline  as  to  formation  on  the  march. 
The  heavy  Whitworth  gun,  with  a  battery  of  Krupp 
fieldpieces  and  half  a  dozen  quick-firers,  made  an 
imposing  show.  A  corps  of  sappers  had  to  go  in 
front  to  prepare  the  way  foi  it,  levelling  the  track  in 
places,  constructing  bridges  at  the  streams,  and  gener- 
ally losing  time.  Of  the  three  roads  that  lead  towards 
Canudos,  two,  those  of  Cambaiao  and  Massacara,  had 

*  "  Llegar  y  besar  al  santo." 

t  Euclydes  da  Cunha,  "Os  Sertoes,"  p.  377. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  203 

been  rendered  almost  transitable  by  the  expeditions 
that  had  failed.  Their  worst  asperities  had  been 
levelled  down  and  their  strategic  points  were  known. 
The  third  road  that  led  by  Calumby  was  the  shortest 
of  the  three,  and  the  least  difficult.  This  road  the 
Jagun9os  had  fortified  so  strongly  that  it  would  have 
been  impossible  to  force.  Therefore  the  expedition 
avoided  it,  passing  to  the  eastward  under  the  slopes  of 
Mont  Aracaty,  and  following  more  or  less  the  track  of 
the  first  expedition  that  had  essayed  the  task. 

Of  all  the  expeditions,  the  fourth,  encumbered  as  it 
was  with  a  full  military  train,  advanced  the  slowest. 
Four  or  five  painful  days  upon  the  road  brought  them 
into  the  danger  zone  at  the  Lagoa  da  Lage,  where  for 
the  first  time  they  had  a  skirmish  with  the  enemy. 
By  the  26th,  they  only  had  advanced  eighty  kilometres 
from  Monte  Santo  upon  their  painful  road.  At 
times,  in  order  to  avoid  marshy  places  where  the  big 
gun  would  certainly  have  sunk,  they  had  to  cut  a  path 
for  a  mile  or  two  through  the  thick  bush,  a  perfect 
labyrinth  of  thorns. 

Colonel  Siqueira  de  Menezes,  who  accompanied  the 
expedition,  in  an  article  to  the  newspaper  O  Paiz, 
of  Rio,  has  preserved  the  names  of  some  of  the  most 
thorny  plants,  as  Chique-Chique,  Palmatorio,  Rabo  de 
Raposa,*  Mundacarus,  Croas,  Cabe9a  de  Frade,"f'  and 
many  more,  whose  designations  are  as  terrific  as  the 
most  thorny  of  the  thorns. 

From  this  time  forward  the  expedition  was  con- 
tinuously attacked.  Ambushes  by  day,  alarms  by 
night,  attempts  to  stampede  the  baggage  animals, 
*  Fox's  tail.  t  Friar's  head. 


204  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

succeeded  one  another,  giving  the  troops  no  rest. 
Arrived  at  the  ill-fated  position  of  Angico,  they  passed 
along  the  deep,  v^^orn  path,  betv^een  thick  bush,  v^here 
the  heads  of  those  decapitated  by  the  Jagun90s,  after 
the  rout  of  the  third  expedition,  were  all  stuck  up  on 
stakes.  It  seemed  to  the  raw  troops  that  they  had 
entered  on  the  road  to  hell,  so  great  their  horror  was, 
as  the  wind  swayed  some  of  the  mummied  bodies, 
which  had  been  fastened  to  the  trees,  in  a  fantastic 
dance. 

Lastly,  they  came  upon  the  body  of  Colonel 
Tamarindo,  still  with  black  gloves  upon  the  hands, 
the  decapitated  head  hung  from  a  branch  above  it, 
and  a  little  farther  on,  his  horse,  still  on  its  feet 
against  the  bank,  with  its  mane  waving  in  the  breeze. 
As  they  were  passing  the  defile,  guarded  by  the  dry 
bodies  of  their  former  comrades,  Pajehu  attacked  in 
force,  but  hidden  by  the  bush.  A  rain  of  bullets  fell 
amongst  the  troops  marching  in  close  formation,  and 
in  a  moment  there  were  many  casualties  inflicted  by 
the  unseen  enemy.  The  quick-firing  guns  enabled 
them  to  beat  back  the  attack,  and  in  the  evening  they 
arrived  at  Monte  Favella  that  overlooked  the  town. 

The  expedition  camped  in  the  valley  underneath 
the  hill.  From  the  low  hill,  the  General  and  his  Staff 
gazed  down  with  wonder  on  the  town.  Was  this  the 
place — a  mere  assemblage  of  mud-huts  that  looked  so 
fragile  that  it  seemed  a  push  would  throw  them  on 
the  ground — that  had  foiled  three  expeditions,  well 
equipped  with  modern  arms  ?  It  seemed  impossible  ; 
but  as  he  gazed  he  saw  the  trenches  connecting 
up  the  various  rivers  encircling  all  the  town,  and  he 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  205 

was  soon  forced  to  confess  that  the  task  he  had  under- 
taken might  prove  formidable. 

Hardly  had  the  troops  encamped  when  an  attack 
broke  out,  the  Jagun9os  having  crept  up  like  snakes 
amongst  the  bushes  and  the  grass,  without  a  sign  of 
their  approach.  Two  companies  which  had  been 
thrown  out  in  advance  bore  the  full  brunt  of  the 
assault,  and  suffered  heavily.  When  the  moon  rose, 
about  the  middle  of  the  night,  there  was  a  general 
attack  upon  them.  This  lasted  for  an  hour  or  two, 
and  as  the  first  faint  streaks  of  dawn  appeared  the 
Jagun9os  silently  withdrew,  having  inflicted  heavy 
losses  on  the  troops,  almost  without  a  casualty  to  them- 
selves, shooting  the  soldiers  down  from  the  shelter  of 
the  darkness,  as  they  fired  wildly,  at  the  flashing  of 
their  guns. 

When  morning  broke  at  last,  the  General  buried 
his  dead,  and  then  got  his  artillery  into  position, 
hoping  to  end  the  matter  in  a  day  or  two  with  his 
superior  arms,  and  to  return  a  victor  from  the  field 
where  all  his  predecessors  had  failed  lamentably. 
Thus  once  again,  lost  in  the  heart  of  the  Sertao,  was 
the  stage  set  for  the  old  contest  between  the  forces 
representing  law  and  order,  and  the  old  world,  in 
which  each  man  was  a  law  unto  himself — the  world 
of  myths  and  portents,  prophets  and  miracles.  The  old 
and  new  stood  face  to  face  before  Canudos,  one  savage, 
brutal,  but  not  the  least  ashamed ;  the  other  painted 
in  bands  of  parti-coloured  hue,  with  Progress, 
Humanity,  and  Toleration  writ  large  upon  them.  On 
the  one  side  a  pack  of  wolves,  and  on  the  other 
a  submarine,  charged  with  torpedoes  and  with  mines. 


CHAPTER    XVI 

Though  with  the  force  the  Government  had  assembled 
before  Canudos  there  could  be  no  doubt  of  their 
ultimate  success,  ill  luck  dogged  all  their  efforts  from 
the  start.  The  fatal  habit  of  holding  the  Jagun^os 
too  cheaply  as  enemies  cost  them  the  lives  of  many 
of  their  best  officers  and  a  great  toll  of  casualties 
amongst  their  men.  On  the  morning  of  the  28th  the 
artillery  opened  fire  upon  Canudos  at  the  first  dawn 
of  day.  It  was  to  be  expected  that  the  miserably 
built  town  would  be  reduced  to  ashes  in  a  few  hours, 
under  the  fire  of  modern  guns. 

Events  proved  that  the  defenders  of  the  place  had 
natural  military  instincts  of  a  high  order  for  defence. 
Hardly  had  the  guns  begun  to  fire,  than  from  pits 
constructed  so  as  to  be  invisible,  from  trenches  in  the 
town  and  from  the  thick  bush,  that  the  imprudent 
leader  of  the  governmental  forces  had  omitted  to 
destroy,  a  well-sustained  rifle-fire  was  opened  on  the 
artillerymen.  In  half  an  hour  they  had  lost  more 
than  a  hundred  men  and  many  officers. 

Their  fire,  to  their  astonishment,  made  little  im- 
pression on  the  town,  except  to  level  open  lines 
through    the   mud-built    houses,   the   inhabitants    all 

206 


LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO     207 

having  taken  shelter  in  hiding-places  underground. 
The  Jagun^o  sharp-shooters,  led  by  Pajehu,  revealed 
a  courage  and  a  coolness  under  fire  quite  unexpected 
of  them  by  their  enemies.  Safe  in  their  hiding- 
places,  they  lay  hid  under  a  hail  of  projectiles,  replying 
instantly  when  the  storm  slackened  by  a  well-directed 
fire.  The  General,  Arthur  Oscar,  mad  with  rage  at 
losing  so  many  of  his  best  men,  ordered  a  general 
assault.  His  troops  rushed  down  the  hill,  entering 
the  town  after  having  forded  the  little  river  that  had 
proved  so  disastrous  a  passage  to  the  third  expedition, 
and  soon  were  swallowed  up  in  the  labyrinth  of  lanes. 
A  hurricane  of  fire  burst  on  them  from  every  side  ; 
from  houses,  trenches,  rifle-pits  and  from  the  church, 
they  were  exposed  to  a  veritable  massacre.  After 
having  penetrated  to  the  square,  destroying  street  after 
street  of  huts  as  they  advanced,  in  order  to  secure 
themselves  from  an  attack  in  the  rear,  they  were  forced 
to  execute  what  the  General  described  in  his  despatch 
as  a  "  well-executed  strategic  movement,  that  placed 
our  forces  once  more  under  the  protection  of  the 
guns." 

In  fact,  he  had  suffered  a  reverse,  and  lost,  since 
daybreak,  more  than  three  hundred  men.  The 
situation  was  not  pleasant.  His  men  were  on  half 
rations,  and  the  provision  mule-trains  had  been 
attacked  upon  the  road  by  the  Jagun^os,  who, 
although  forced  to  retire,  had  wounded  many  of  the 
pack  animals  and  caused  a  long  delay. 

Water  was  plentiful  in  the  stream  that  flowed  below 
the  spot  on  which  the  General  was  encamped.  The  pas- 
sage to  and  fro  to  it  was  rendered  possible  by  the  artillery. 


2o8  LIFE  AND   MIRACLES  OF 

Situated  as  he  was,  the  General's  first  necessity  was 
to  reinforce  his  troops.  Most  anxiously  he  waited  for 
the  arrival  of  General  Savaget,  whom  he  had  dis- 
patched with  a  column  of  two  thousand  men  and 
several  Krupp  guns,  to  converge  on  the  position  and 
take  it  in  the  rear. 

He  too  had  been  attacked  upon  the  road,  for  the 
Jagun9os  displayed  much  greater  enterprise  on  this 
occasion  than  they  had  done  before.  At  the  rate  of 
two  leagues'^  a  day,  the  column  under  General 
Savaget  toiled  through  the  sand,  its  marches  regulated 
by  the  necessity  of  reaching  water  and  pasture  for  the 
animals.  It  hugged  the  banks  of  the  River  Vasa-Barris, 
so  as  to  be  protected  on  one  flank. 

Successively  it  passed  the  miserable  villages  or 
half-ruined  "  fazendas "  of  Passagem,  Canna  Brava, 
Brejinho,  Manary,  Cauche  and  Serra  Vermelha, 
camping  on  June  the  25th  at  a  place  called  Cocorobo, 
where  they  expected  they  would  be  attacked.  For 
the  first  time  a  Brazilian  General  did  not  fall  into  the 
trap  laid  for  him  by  the  Jagun^os,  with  his  eyes 
closed  and  over-confident. 

At  this  place  the  only  road  ran  through  a  deep 
defile.  A  cavalry  detachment  sent  on  to  reconnoitre 
found  the  position  entrenched  and  held  in  force. 
Nothing  remained  to  General  Savaget  but  to  advance 
and  carry  the  defences  with  the  bayonet.  Advancing 
through  a  fire  that  decimated  them,  the  Brazilian 
infantry  displayed  the  admirable  qualities  that  they 
have    always    shown,    when    they    have    been    well- 

*  The  Brazilian  league  is  about  three  English  miles,  rather  more 
than  less. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  209 

officered  and  led.  On  this  occasion  they  sustained 
their  reputation  to  the  full. 

Attacked  on  every  side,  in  a  position  in  which  it 
was  impossible  to  use  their  superior  weapons  to 
advantage,  their  officers  falling  like  corn  before  the 
sickle,  under  the  fire  of  a  concealed  and  watchful 
enemy,  they  steadily  advanced.  Rocks  bounded  down 
the  slopes  of  the  defile  like  greyhounds,  making  great 
breaches  in  their  ranks.  Their  officers  fell  fast  under 
the  fire  of  hidden  sharpshooters.  Now  and  then  figures 
appeared  on  the  high  cliffs,  fired,  and  with  a  yell  sank 
back  again  under  the  shelter  of  a  rock.  Never  before 
had  the  Jagun9os  held  a  position  with  such  tenacity. 
It  seemed  as  if  for  the  first  time  they  really  compre- 
hended that  their  country  was  a  natural  fortress,  with 
points  of  vantage  arranged  by  Providence. 

The  General's  horse  was  killed,  and  he,  when  he 
had  disengaged  himself  from  the  fallen  animal,  ad- 
vanced on  foot,  followed  by  the  harassed  infantry, 
until  at  last,  with  heavy  losses,  they  emerged  upon  the 
plain.  Thenceforward  their  progress  was  a  con- 
tinuous fight.  From  every  rock  and  tree,  or  from  the 
midst  of  the  tall  grass  and  bushes,  unseen  sharp- 
shooters galled  their  march,  taking  a  heavy  toll  of 
them  in  casualties. 

Bands  of  light  horsemen,  their  leather  clothes 
blending  so  well  with  the  landscape  as  to  render  them 
almost  invisible  at  a  little  distance  off,  picked  up  the 
stragglers,  lassoing  them  and  trailing  them  to  death 
behind  their  horses,  in  sight  of  the  raging  but  im- 
potent troops  upon  the  march.  The  cavalry  of  the 
Government,  heavily  equipped,  could  never  come  up 

14 


2IO  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

to  engage  the  Jagun9o  horsemen,  who  fled  into  the 
bush,  hanging  alongside  their  horses  and  firing  under- 
neath their  necks,  after  the  fashion  of  the  Arabs,  or  the 
Indians  of  the  plains.  Little  by  little  the  enemy  fell 
back,  disputing  every  coign  of  vantage,  and  when  at 
last  the  column  reached  Favella,  their  losses  in  the  three 
leagues  they  had  travelled  totalled  three  hundred  men. 

Once  at  Favella,  General  Savaget  sent  off  a  mes- 
senger to  announce  his  safe  arrival  to  the  Commander- 
in-Chief,  only  a  mile  away.  The  messenger  returned 
with  urgent  orders  to  advance.  When  the  tired 
soldiers  arrived  outside  the  main  encampment  on  the 
farther  slopes  of  Mount  Favella,  just  above  the  town, 
they  found  it  invested  by  the  Jagun9os  on  every  side. 
Thus  the  first  task  General  Savaget  found  waiting  for 
him  was  to  relieve  his  own  commander  and  his  forces 
who  were  blockaded  on  the  hill. 

Their  greatest  need  was  for  provisions,  for  the 
Jagun^os  were  holding  up  the  mule  trains  that  had 
been  left  inadequately  protected  on  the  road.  Next 
day,  by  a  vigorous  movement  of  the  two  columns, 
General  Savaget  was  able  to  free  the  encampment 
from  the  disastrous  position  it  was  in,  and  force  the 
enemy  with  heavy  losses  to  retire  into  the  town. 

The  situation  was  ironical  enough.  By  far  the 
largest  and  best  furnished  force  the  Government  had 
sent  against  Canudos,  owing  to  fatal  over-confidence, 
found  itself  virtually  besieged,  in  what  should  have 
been  a  strong  position,  by  the  very  people  it  had  set 
out  to  subdue. 

Nine  hundred  casualties  testified  to  the  resistance  of 
the  Jagun9os   to   the  columns  on  the  march.     The 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  211 

superior  arms  they  had  collected  from  the  former 
expeditions  placed  them  more  on  an  equality  with 
the  forces  of  the  Government  than  they  had  been 
before.  Their  knowledge  of  the  country,  and  the 
certainty  that  they  all  fought  with  halters  round  their 
necks,  made  them  most  formidable  antagonists.  In 
Pajehu,  ex-malefactor  and  assassin,  they  had  found  a 
leader  of  no  mean  order  in  the  field.  He  seems  to 
have  thoroughly  comprehended  the  strength  and 
weakness  of  the  men  he  led  to  the  assault,  and  took 
good  care  never  to  fall  into  his  previous  error  of 
launching  them  upon  the  well-armed  troops  in  the 
open,  but  resorted  to  the  guerilla  tactics  natural  to 
every  frontierman  in  every  country  of  the  world. 

Days  passed,  during  which  the  soldiers  on  half 
rations,  short  of  water,  and  confined  within  a  narrow 
space,  began  to  murmur  at  their  fate.  The  famous 
Whitworth  gun,  that  had  cost  so  much  intensity  of 
toil  to  bring  up  from  the  base,  was  wrongly  sighted  and 
could  not  be  depressed  sufficiently  to  bear  upon  the 
town.  Thus  it  became  a  "  monstrous  fetish,"*  but  a 
fetish  without  a  moral  value,  as  the  Jagun^os  soon 
found  out  its  uselessness.  Provisions  daily  ran  lower, 
and  the  chief  train  of  mules,  which  had  left  Quei- 
madas  nearly  a  month  before,  was  still  held  back  upon 
the  road.  The  bombardment  of  the  town  did  not 
give  the  results  that  were  expected  of  it,  and  by  the 
2nd  of  July  the  situation  of  the  expedition  was 
almost  desperate. 

Their  fate  depended   on  provisions,  and  the  pro- 

*  "  Monstruoso  fetiche,"  Euclydes  da  Cunha,  "  Os  Sertoes," 
p.  430- 


212  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

visions  still  were  delayed  upon  the  road.  Men  they 
had  plenty  of,  and  ammunition,  but  not  a  sack  of 
flour,  nor  any  salt  or  beans,  and  beans  are  the  chief 
staple  of  the  Brazilian  troops.  Luckily  for  them,  the 
country  to  the  rear  was  open  to  them,  and  luckier 
still,  a  squadron  all  composed  of  Gauchos  from  the 
south  was  with  the  cavalry.  These  men,  centaurs 
before  the  Lord,  trained  to  the  lazo  and  the  bolas 
from  their  youth  upwards,  proved  invaluable.  Just 
as  did  Garibaldi  before  Rome,  when  in  a  like  position 
to  the  Brazilian  General  before  Canudos,  these  Gauchos 
were  sent  out  to  scour  the  country  and  drive  in 
all  the  cattle  they  could  find.  Nothing  escaped  their 
vigilance,  and  in  a  day  or  two  bands  of  thin  cattle 
were  driven  in  towards  the  troops.  It  was  a  joyful 
moment  when  the  Gauchos,  hurling  their  long,  hide 
lazos  through  the  air  like  snakes,  planted  them  un- 
erringly upon  the  horns  of  a  lean  cow  or  bullock,  and 
dragged  it  to  the  ground.  In  an  instant,  like  a  flock 
of  vultures,  the  soldiers  swarmed  round  the  fallen 
animal,  despatched  it  with  their  sword  bayonets,  and 
speedily  put  down  the  joints  to  roast  before  the  fire. 
The  food  put  spirit  once  again  into  their  hearts. 

At  best  it  was  a  temporary  expedient,  for  all  the 
Gauchos  could  secure  were  ten  or  twelve  lean  animals 
a  day,  and  that  was  little  when  distributed  amongst 
six  thousand  men,  all  clamouring  for  food.  The 
supply  of  cattle  soon  was  exhausted,  and  no  resource 
remained  but  to  hunt  the  goats  that  had  gone  wild 
amongst  the  hills,  and  to  dig  underneath  the  ground 
for  "as  patatas  do  Vaqueiro,"*  a  root  that  has  saved 
*  See  Introduction,  p.  17. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  213 

life,  in  drought  and  famine,  a  thousand  times  in  the 
Sertao. 

Desertions  soon  became  frequent,  but  ceased  when 
it  was  known  that  those  who  escaped  death  by  thirst 
and  hunger  on  the  road  usually  fell  into  the  hands  of 
the  Jagun90s  and  were  killed  instantly.  No  news 
arrived  of  the  provision  train  up  to  the  middle  of 
July,  and  the  Commander  of  the  expedition  found 
himself  forced  either  to  retreat  and  face  the  perils  of 
the  march,  and  the  disgrace  that  he  was  sure  awaited 
him  at  home,  or  else  establish  communication  with 
the  train  of  mules  that  he  knew  must  be  bv  this  time 
not  far  off  upon  the  road.  As  a  last  resource  he  got 
together  such  of  his  cavalry  as  had  horses  not  too 
much  exhausted  for  the  march,  and  sent  them  back  to 
serve  as  escort  to  the  advancing  mule  trains,  that  he 
awaited  with  the  same  feelings  as  a  shipwrecked 
sailor  watching  for  a  sail. 

On  the  nth  of  July,  when  hope  was  almost  dried 
up  in  their  hearts,  and  the  harassed  General  was  just 
about  to  order  a  retreat,  with  the  first  streaks  of  day- 
light in  the  sky,  a  friendly  Sertanejo  rode  into  the 
camp.  Behind  him  came  three  troopers  mounted  on 
horses,  lame  and  travel-worn.  The  countryman  was 
the  conveyer  of  a  message  from  the  officer  in  com- 
mand of  the  escort  that  accompanied  the  train.  He 
had  arrived  at  a  day's  journey  from  the  encampment, 
but  feared  to  cross  the  danger  zone  with  the  small 
forces  that  he  led. 

The  Sertanejo  looked  at  the  starving  men  with 
wonder,  as  he  sat  like  an  equestrian  statue  on  his 
horse,  for,  in  the  fashion  of  his  countrymen,  he  would 


214     LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 

not  alight  without  a  special  invitation,  as  to  have  done 
so  would  have  been  a  breach  of  courtesy.  Slowly  he 
reined  his  horse  back  towards  where  the  General  and 
his  officers  stood  waiting  for  him,  making  it  rear  and 
passage  as  he  went.  Taking  his  hat  off,  he  drew  the 
letter  from  it,  and  after  handing  it  to  the  General,  at 
a  sign  of  welcome,  swung  himself  in  one  motion  from 
the  saddle,  and  taking  off  his  horse's  bridle,  he  sat 
down  silently  to  smoke,  with  his  eyes  fixed  on  vacancy, 
but  observing  everything. 

Joy  rang  through  the  encampment,  and  when  at 
last,  next  day  at  evening,  long  trains  of  mules  laden 
with  bread  and  flour,  with  rum,  with  sugar,  coffee,  and 
with  jerked  beef,  filed  slowly  into  the  hunger-stricken 
camp,  the  soldiers'  spirits  rose,  and  they  demanded  to 
be  led  to  the  attack. 

Next  day  they  rested  and  refreshed  themselves. 
The  General  held  a  council  with  his  officers.  Night 
fell  upon  the  camp,  amidst  a  clang  of  preparations,  of 
songs,  of  horses  neighing,  and  all  the  animation  that 
takes  hold  of  men  in  like  positions,  who  know  that 
it  may  be  the  last  occasion  when  they  will  laugh  and 
sing. 

Then,  in  the  starry  silence  of  the  tropic  night,  the 
Ave  Maria  ascended  from  the  town,  and  the  long 
melopea  of  the  litanies. 


CHAPTER   XVII 

It  was  indeed  time  for  the  matter  to  be  decided  in 
one  way  or  another.  The  concussion  of  the  Govern- 
ment's reverse  had  been  felt  to  the  remotest  corner  of 
Brazil.  Canudos  had  become  a  household  word. 
Right  up  in  Amazonas ;  in  the  dark  glades  of  Matto 
Grosso ;  on  the  frontiers  of  Guiana,  the  little  village 
in  the  Sertao  of  Bahia  was  known  to  everyone. 

In  Rio  Grande  do  Sul,  the  sceptical  and  careless 
Gauchos  talked  of  it  at  cattle-markings  and  at  fairs, 
laughing  and  making  game  of  both  sides,  after  their 
usual  way.     The  Government,  they  saw,  was  weak,  and 
yet   they   did   not    give   much    credence   to   Antonio 
Conselheiro's    wonder-working    powers.       After    the 
materialistic    fashion   of   most    dwellers   upon    plains 
where  horses  are  plentiful,  a  piece  of  beef,  a  cup  of 
mate,  a  fine  day,  a  handsome  girl,  or  a  good  horse, 
engrossed  their  minds  more  than  the  possible  destruc- 
tion of  the   world,   foretold   by   the   prophet   of   the 
Sertao.       Such  clergy  as  they  had  amongst  them  had 
to  ride  them  on  a  light  hand,  or  they  would  have 
revolted  altogether  from  their  control.       In  the  same 
way  the  Bedouin  Arabs  of  Arabia,  living  under  con- 
ditions so  similar  to  those  of  the  Gauchos  on  the  plains 
of   South   America,   have   always   been   refractory   to 

215 


2i6  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

religious  teaching,  holding  Islam  but  at  the  most  a 
council  of  perfection,  and  living,  even  to-day,  much  as 
their  forbears  lived  in  the  days  when  the  seven  poems 
of  the  Moalakat  were  written,  and  hung  up  for  all 
men  to  admire. 

Mountains,  with  mist  and  ever-changing  weather, 
streams,  lakes  and  waterfalls  with  rainbows  playing  on 
them,  great  trees,  and  life  circumscribed  within  more 
or  less  narrow  limits  by  the  valleys  and  the  hills,  drive 
men  to  introspection,  and  to  a  feeling  of  their  own 
impotence,  before  the  superior  force  of  Nature.  On 
the  wide  plains,  man  is  his  own  star,  and  the  horse 
places  him  more  on  a  level  with  natural  forces ;  not 
caring  to  scale  a  heaven  that  is  not  imminent,  he  is 
content  to  live  his  life,  lord  of  the  earth,  and,  in  a 
greater  measure  than  elsewhere,  makes  his  own 
destiny. 

The  dangerous  feeling,  half  of  amazement,  half  of 
ridicule,  that  had  been  excited  by  the  defeats  they  had 
incurred,  and  by  the  long  delay  to  which  their 
relatively  great  fourth  expedition  had  been  subjected, 
stirred  up  the  Government,  and  they  sent  messages  to 
their  Commander  not  to  put  off  attack. 

Upon  the  other  side,  and  notwithstanding  that  he 
must  have  known  the  end  was  certain,  Antonio 
Conselheiro  gave  no  sign  of  weakness,  but  set  himself 
resolutely  to  meet  the  Government's  assault.  His  past 
successes  had  so  much  increased  his  fame,  that  from 
the  eternal  forests  and  swamps  of  Matto  Grosso,  from 
those  deep  matted  woods  where  giant  trees  spring  up 
two  hundred  feet  in  height,  and  where  the  only  way 
to  penetrate  the  thickets  is  by  following  the  streams. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  217 

from  every  little  clearing,  recruits  once  more  flocked 
to  the  Sertao.  They  came  on  donkeys  and  on  mules, 
on  bullocks  and  on  foot,  following  the  forest  trails. 
For  weeks  they  marched  under  a  tangled  vegetation, 
so  thick  that  the  sun's  rays  had  never  penetrated  to 
the  ground.  Humming  birds  darted  to  and  fro  in  the 
rare  clearings,  like  flakes  of  topaz  or  of  amethyst. 
The  pilgrims  never  heeded  them,  nor  turned  their 
heads,  when  now  and  then  in  passing  over  little  plains 
flocks  of  macaws — green,  red  and  yellow — soared 
past  like  falcons,  uttering  their  hoarse  cry. 

Great  troops  of  monkeys  gambolled  in  the  woods, 
performing  their  aerial  gymnastics  as  it  were  for  the 
travellers'  amusement,  swinging  from  tree  to  tree.  At 
night  they  raised  their  melancholy  chorus,  howling 
like  foghorns,  heard  dimly  through  the  folds  of  a  sea 
mist.  The  men  and  women  tramping  along  were  no 
more  moved  with  their  nocturnal  psalmody  than  with 
their  feats  upon  the  trees.  With  their  minds  fixed 
upon  their  Zion,  Canudos,  the  mystic  city  where  their 
prophet  dwelt,  for  which  they  had  sold  all  their  poor 
possessions  and  set  forth  to  see  him  and  to  touch  his 
raiment,  the  misguided,  but  perhaps  happy  and  con- 
tented, illuminated  folk  endured  their  misery  upon 
the  road.  They  passed  by  back-waters,  carpeted  over 
with  the  giant  leaves  of  the  Victoria  Regia,  upon 
whose  banks  were  egrets,  white  as  snow,  standing 
immovable,  with  something  sacred  in  their  look,  as 
they  watched  for  the  fish  beneath  the  steaming  waters 
of  the  lake.  Across  their  path,  now  and  then,  bounded 
wild  cats  and  jaguars,  their  spotted  skins  blending 
exactly  with  the  prevailing  plants  and  vegetation,  so 


21 8  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

that  in  an  instant  they  had  become  a  part  of  it,  and 
disappeared.  From  the  tall  tree  tops  amongst  the 
purple,  red,  and  multi-coloured  flowers  of  the  lianas, 
came  the  sloth's  melancholy  cry.  Tapirs  and  peccaries 
passed  in  full  view  of  them,  and  in  the  streams  they 
crossed,  carpinchos*"  swam,  their  heads  awash,  looking 
like  little  hippopotami.  Huge  logs  rolled  lazily  into 
the  water,  showing  themselves  to  have  been  alligators. 
Deep  in  the  recesses  of  the  forests,  came  the  sonorous 
notes  of  the  bell-bird,  which  makes  one  think  that 
somewhere  there  must  be  a  chapel  in  the  woods  left 
by  the  Jesuits,  or  else  its  wraith,  served  by  some 
phantom  priest.  All  the  bright  wonders,  and  the 
dark  melancholy  of  the  tropic  everglades,  was  unrolled 
before  the  eyes  of  these  modern  Israelites,  plodding 
along  towards  their  stony,  burned-up  Canaan,  guided 
but  by  the  fiery  pillar  each  one  carried  in  his  heart. 

When  they  arrived  before  the  reed-built,  palm- 
thatched  city  they  stopped  and  broke  out  into 
psalmody.  All  that  they  had  endured  was  counted 
nothing,  for  now  they  could  not  err  upon  the  path 
towards  salvation,  with  Zion  full  in  view. 

The  rude  Paulistas  from  their  cattle  farms  round 
Surucaba,  the  miners  from  Goyaz,  the  gatherers  of 
caoutchouc  in  the  Amazonian  forests,  sent  their  con- 
tingents ;  and  from  all  parts  and  portions  of  the  mighty 
empire  so  many  pilgrims  came  that  they  were  forced 
to  encamp,  and  build  great  villages  of  huts. 

"See  Rome  and  lose  your  faith," -f-  the  adage  ran  in 

*  The  Capybara  of  naturalists.     The  largest  known  member  of 
the  rodent  family. 

t  "  Roma  veduta,  fede  perduta." 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  219 

the  old  days,  when  the  spiritual  descendant  of  the 
Galilean  fishermen  used  to  dominate  the  world. 
Whether  Canudos,  ill-built  and  dirty,  poor  and 
miserable,  with  its  sectarian  life  of  sexual  licence  and 
eternal  psalmody,  had  a  like  effect  upon  the  pilgrims, 
is  known  to  no  man.  After  the  catastrophe,  most  of 
them  disappeared  again  into  the  forest  trails  from 
which  they  had  emerged,  and  by  degrees  regained 
their  homes,  leaving  as  little  traces  of  their  passage  as 
does  a  flight  of  flying  fish  after  its  brief  excursion 
into  air. 

Within  the  town,  the  spiritual  life  daily  became  more 
highly  keyed  up,  and  still  more  intense.  The  prophet 
passed  the  day  in  preparations  for  defence  ;  the  night 
in  prayer  and  preaching,  and  all  the  sectaries  under  his 
ministrations  prepared  themselves  to  die.  As  often 
happens  in  like  circumstances,  either  in  times  of 
pestilence  or  siege,  the  people  all  abandoned  themselves 
to  sexual  excesses,  only  to  be  paralleled  amongst  their 
prototypes  in  Phrygia  and  in  Cilicia,  when  the  con- 
tending Orthodox  and  Gnostic  sects  strove  for  the 
mastery.  "  God's  people  ever  were  a  backsliding 
folk,"  ran  the  old  Scottish  saying,  and  the  same  proved 
true  in  the  Sertao.  This  did  not  stop  them  from 
laying  plans  for  their  defence  with  judgment  and  with 
skill.  Thus  fortified,  both  by  their  trenches  and 
their  faith,  they  stood  at  bay,  awaiting  the  last  move 
of  the  Government. 

They  had  not  long  to  wait,  for  on  the  i8th  of 
July,  after  his  troops  had  rested  and  reinforcements 
had  come  up,  General  Arthur  Oscar  gave  the  signal 
for  attack.       For  the  last  day  or  two  the  artillery  had 


220  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

rained  shells  upon  the  town,  but  their  effect  was 
inconsiderable.  Either  the  artillerymen  were  not 
trained  to  their  task,  or  the  fragile  nature  of  the  houses 
of  the  town  allowed  the  projectiles  to  pass  through 
them  like  paper,  without  exploding,  or  for  some  other 
cause,  the  bombardment  failed  of  its  result.  Nothing 
was  left  but  an  assault  in  force,  and  this  was  fixed  for 
the  1 8th  of  July.  As  usual,  the  spirits  of  the  troops 
ran  high.  All  were  most  anxious  to  be  led  to  the 
attack,  and  once  again  they  fell  into  the  trap  of  over- 
confidence.  It  seemed  impossible  that  six  thousand 
well-armed  men,  furnished  with  ample  ammunition 
and  artillery,  should  not  at  once  possess  themselves  of 
a  miserable  town  of  shanties,  defended  by  men  void 
of  discipline.  Civilised  and  disciplined  soldiers  are 
always  at  their  worst  and  weakest  in  wild  countries. 
All  is  unfamiliar  to  them.  They  see  no  houses, 
churches,  cows,  or  sheep  and  horses  grazing  ;  there 
are  no  hedges,  ditches,  railway  embankments,  or  any 
of  the  familiar  features  of  a  European  landscape. 
Distances  are  always  greater  than  those  they  have  been 
used  to  in  their  homes.  The  atmosphere  is  puzzling, 
crows  appear  bullocks,  bullocks  crows,  in  the  clear  air. 
A  range  of  hills  that  looks  a  few  miles  distant  may 
prove  a  long  day's  journey  off  Insensibly,  the  con- 
fidence of  the  training  camp  is  undermined,  for  the 
enemy  they  have  been  taught  to  expect  under  condi- 
tions not  unlike  their  own  is  never  visible,  and  on 
the  rare  occasions  when  he  shows  himself  seems  like 
a  phantom  of  the  night.  Then,  when  the  troops 
begin  to  think  he  is  contemptible,  and  that  their 
task  will  prove  a  military  promenade,  a  feeling  that 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  221 

invariably  overtakes  disciplined,  well-armed  men  in 
such  surroundings,  without  a  moment's  warning,  out  of 
nothing  as  it  were,  up  from  the  long  grass,  behind  a 
line  of  stones,  or  from  the  reeds  upon  a  river's  bank, 
the  long-sought  enemy  appears,  and  in  an  instant 
inflicts  considerable  loss.  Fury  possesses  every  heart, 
that  men  they  had  despised  could  prove  so  formidable, 
and  fury  turns  to  impotency  when  the  troops  find, 
encumbered  as  they  are  with  all  the  lumber  of  a 
European  regiment,  that  all  pursuit  is  vain. 

Such  warfare  tries  the  best  of  troops  to  the  utmost, 
as  we  found  in  South  Africa,  and  as  the  French  found 
in  the  Soudan.  In  the  Sertao  it  was  intensified, 
for  the  men  the  army  was  opposed  to  were  their 
own  countrymen.  The  soldiers  passed  the  night  in 
celebrating  the  expected  victory.  At  daybreak  they 
moved  to  the  attack,  advancing  bravely  under  the  fire 
of  their  artillery  and  entering  the  town.  As  upon 
former  instances,  not  a  shot  was  fired  by  the  Jagun9os 
until  the  soldiers  were  well  engaged  amongst  the 
streets,  and  the  artillery  was  obliged  to  cease  its  fire, 
for  fear  of  killing  their  own  soldiers  with  the  enemy. 
When  the  long  columns  of  the  troops  had  entered  the 
tortuous  lanes  of  huts,  the  fire  of  the  Jagun^os  broke 
out  upon  them.  This  time  the  sectaries  were  better 
armed — with  the  rifles  and  the  ammunition  they  had 
taken  from  the  former  expeditions — and  the  troops, 
huddled  up  amongst  the  lanes,  soon  suffered  terribly. 
Men  fell  on  all  sides,  but  the  attack  was  well  sustained, 
and  did  not  lose  its  energy  till  it  had  carried  a  little 
eminence  that  looked  down  on  the  interior  of  the 
town.     Had  there  been  forces  in  sufficient  numbers  to 


222  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

advance,  well  officered  and  led,  the  fate  of  Canudos 
would  shortly  have  been  sealed  ;  but  nearly  all  the 
officers  had  fallen,  and  the  attacking  column  was 
completely  isolated.  The  General  rushed  up  rein- 
forcements, and  the  position  was  assured  ;  but  the 
troops  who  had  fought  bravely  all  through  the  day 
were  thoroughly  worn  out. 

Camped  on  the  eminence  that  they  had  conquered, 
but  unable  to  go  on,  the  new  encampment  found 
itself  isolated,  with  its  advance  into  the  town  rendered 
impossible,  and  its  communications  with  the  base 
dangerous  and  difficult.  The  night  passed  unmolested, 
and  they  employed  it  in  digging  trenches  and  in 
strengthening  the  hill.  When  morning  broke  they 
were  surrounded  by  the  enemy,  and  from  the  huts 
issued  a  swarm  of  women  and  girls,  all  armed  with 
hatchets  and  with  knives,  butchering  the  wounded  as 
they  lay  helpless  on  the  ground.  Three  times  the 
General-in-Chief  rushed  reinforcements  up  to  them, 
only  to  see  them  beaten  back  again.  Then,  getting 
off  his  horse,  he  headed  the  fourth  charge  in  person, 
advancing  bravely  through  a  storm  of  bullets,  till  he 
reached  the  eminence.  After  a  council,  he  determined 
to  hold  on  at  any  cost,  and  to  take  the  town,  street 
after  street,  or  house  by  house,  if  it  proved  necessary. 

Dreams  of  a  swift  triumph  now  had  vanished,  and  all 
the  officers  perceived  that  it  would  take  a  siege 
extending  over  months  to  make  an  end  of  it.  A 
thousand  casualties  in  the  last  operation  had  consider- 
ably reduced  his  forces,  and  the  General,  though  much 
against  his  will,  was  forced  to  ask  for  reinforcements 
once  again  for  his  depleted  ranks. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  223 

The  next  few  days  passed  quietly,  for  on  both  sides 
the  casualties  had  been  enormous,  so  for  the  moment 
the  days  were  passed  in  skirmishing,  in  which  the 
troops  lost  heavily  in  their  exposed  positions  ;  and  the 
enemy,  if  he  lost  many  men,  was  always  able  to 
conceal  his  losses  and  carry  off  his  dead. 

All  day  the  noise  of  firing  went  on  ceaselessly,  and 
then  at  nightfall,  whilst  the  troops  sat  silent  round 
their  fires,  the  sound  of  litanies  was  wafted  from  the 
town,  as  if  the  inhabitants  looked  on  the  fighting  as  a 
mere  incident,  and  when  the  darkness  fell  upon  their 
town,  turned  to  reality. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

Whilst  General  Arthur  Oscar  waited  for  reinforce- 
ments after  having  sent  his  wounded  back  to  the  rail- 
head, a  journey  that  they  had  to  do  on  foot,  on 
mules,  in  bullock  carts,  almost  without  provisions  and 
exposed  to  sun  and  rain,  the  partisans  of  Antonio  Con- 
selheiro  grew  more  daring  every  day.  Not  content 
with  blockading  the  advanced  section  of  their  in- 
vaders closely  in  their  camp,  they  raided  all  the 
country  for  miles  on  every  side.  They  took  the  town 
of  Viela  de  Santa  Anna  and  sacked  it  utterly,  and 
wasted  the  whole  district  of  Mirandella,  burning  the 
houses  and  carrying  the  cattle  off  from  all  the  farms. 
With  their  instinctive  eye  for  strategical  position  they 
fortified  a  post  upon  the  hills  near  Varzea  da  Ema, 
and  another  at  Caypan.  As  these  points  dominated 
the  chief  road  from  Monte  Santo,  all  the  trains  of 
ammunition  and  of  provisions  coming  to  the  camp 
were  constantly  attacked.  Nothing  could  pass  along 
the  road  without  an  escort,  and  even  thjen  mule  train 
and  escort  were  often  beaten  back  and  forced  to  wait 
for  reinforcements  on  the  way. 

Under  the  impulse  of  fanaticism,  with  a  contempt 
of  death  equal  to  that  shown  by  the  tribes  of  the 
Soudan,   old   Macambira's    son,   with   ten   or  twelve 

224 


LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO     225 

companions,  planned  to  carry  ofF  the  big  gun,  which, 
now  that  it  had  been  put  into  working  order,  did 
great  execution  on  the  town.  Creeping  Hke  snakes 
through  the  long  grass  and  using  every  artifice  of 
frontier  warfare  to  conceal  their  progress,  they  crawled 
into  the  camp.  The  men  were  sleeping,  and  the 
sentinels  did  not  perceive  them,  till  they  rose  silently, 
like  phantoms,  close  beside  the  gun.  If  heroism  be 
a  contempt  of  death,  the  devoted  twelve  who  followed 
Macambira  were  heroes  verily,  for  death  was  certain 
in  their  enterprise. 

Hardly  had  the  gun  begun  to  move  under  their 
united  efforts  than  the  alarm  was  raised.  Alone 
amongst  six  thousand  men,  they  all  fell  dead  around 
their  prize,  except  one  man,  who  in  a  hail  of  bullets, 
brandishing  his  knife  as  he  ran,  leaping  from  side 
to  side,  reached  some  bushes  into  which  he  dis- 
appeared, just  as  a  fish  is  lost  to  view  after  it  leaps 
and  falls  back  in  the  stream. 

Troops  were  converging  on  Canudos  from  every 
point  of  the  republic  of  Brazil.  So  serious  did  the 
situation  seem  to  Ministers  that  they  sent  their  Secre- 
tary of  State  for  War,  Marshal  de  Bittencourt,  to  take 
the  chief  command.  This  officer  was  cast  in  a  different 
mould  from  all  his  predecessors.  Cold,  calculating, 
and  never  to  be  moved  from  the  goal  he  had  in  view, 
his  first  care  was  to  collect  an  overwhelming  force. 

In  a  short  time  nearly  ten  thousand  men,  with  a 
whole  park  of  artillery,  were  brought  together,  and 
converged  upon  the  place.  Marshal  de  Bittencourt 
had  no  idea  of  leaving  anything  to  chance,  nor  did  he 
suffer  from  the  over-confidence  into  which  the  other 

15 


226  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

generals  had  fallen.     By  the  middle  of  September  all 
was  ready  at  the  railhead  for  an  advance  in  force. 

The  short  season  of  the  summer  was  over,  and 
already  the  Sertao  was  putting  on  an  aspect  of 
drought  and  of  aridity,  with  scarcity  of  pasture, 
long  days  of  heat  and  nights  of  frost — a  season  most 
unfavourable  to  troops,  but  advantageous  to  the  last 
degree  to  the  Jagun9os,  to  whom  the  weather,  heat, 
cold,  thirst,  or  hunger  were  indifferent. 

Moreover,  the  position  in  General  Arthur  Oscar's 
camp  was  most  precarious.  Inaction,  with  the  scarcity 
of  food,  had  brought  on  frequent  desertions,  and  the 
deserters,  who  dared  not  face  the  perils  of  the  road, 
remained  in  bands,  hanging  about  the  woods  and 
issuing  forth,  when  they  were  strong  enough,  to 
attack  provision  trains. 

The  Jagun9os,  who  seemed  to  have  ample  supplies 
of  ammunition,  perpetually  attacked  the  camp  and 
cut  off  stragglers,  and  day  by  day,  by  hunger,  battle, 
and  disease,  the  General's  forces  dwindled  until  all 
that  he  could  do  was  to  remain  on  the  defensive  in 
his  camp — to  such  a  pass  had  the  Jagunfos,  helped 
by  their  climate  and  the  want  of  roads,  reduced  a 
force  of  full  six  thousand  soldiers,  armed  and  disci- 
plined, and  backed  by  modern  guns.  The  monstrous, 
incompleted  temple,  that  the  fire  of  the  artillery  had 
failed  to  batter  down,  still  dominated  the  camp  of  the 
besieging  force.  The  Jagun9os  had  erected  crows'  nests 
on  it,  from  which  they  spied  each  movement  in  the 
camp,  and  from  its  highest  points  sharp-shooters  were 
ensconced,  that  could  not  be  dislodged  by  the  artillery 
fire. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  227 

Inside  the  town  enthusiasm  ran  high.  The  ignorant 
Jagun^os  had  no  idea  of  the  strength  of  the  two  con- 
tending parties,  and  even  if  they  had,  looked  to  a 
miracle  from  their  good  Councillor  that  would  redeem 
their  town.  What  men  such  as  were  Pajehii  and 
Macambira,  Joao  Abade,  and  the  rest  of  the  guerilla 
leaders  thought,  no  one  can  tell,  but  it  may  be  such 
worldly  wisdom  as  they  had  was  swallowed  up  in  the 
general  wave  of  superstition  prevailing  in  the  town. 
None  of  them  faltered,  and  not  one  of  them  attempted 
to  escape  what  they  must  all  have  known  was  the 
impending  doom,  but  fought  on  faithfully,  giving 
their  lives  as  cheerfully  as  did  the  rudest  and  most 
uneducated. 

No  prisoners  had  been  taken,  for  the  Jagun90s  gave 
no  quarter,  and  on  their  own  side  carried  off  all  their 
wounded,  so  that  neither  party  had  the  least  knowledge 
of  its  opponent's  mind.  So  serious  the  situation  had 
become  by  the  end  of  September  that,  had  not  Marshal 
de  Bittencourt  been  already  on  the  road,  the  fourth 
expedition  would  have  been  forced  to  straggle  back  to 
Monte  Santo  after  the  fashion  of  its  predecessors. 
General  Barbosa,  the  second  in  command,  had  been 
dangerously  wounded,  right  in  the  middle  of  the 
camp,  and  every  regiment  was  depleted  by  a  third  of 
its  full  strength  by  desertion  and  disease,  and  by  the 
losses  of  the  fight.  The  Marshal's  force  was  now 
upon  the  road,  advancing  steadily,  as  if  it  had  been  in 
a  foreign  country  rather  than  in  Brazil,  with  scouts 
thrown  out  on  every  side,  and  searching  all  the  bushes 
with  artillery. 

When   it  arrived  it  found   the   troops  of  General 


228  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Arthur  Oscar  almost   at   the  last   gasp   for  want   of 

food  and  every  necessary.     A  day  or  two  put  all  in 

order,  and  with  ten  thousand  men,  provisions,  guns, 

ammunition,    and    reinforcements    pouring    in    from 

every  side,  the  fate  of  the  Jagun9o  Zion  was  settled, 

although  it  still  held  out.     As  time  passed  by,  little 

by  little  the  troops  advanced,  inexorably  destroying 

all  the  houses  as  they  went,  so  as  not  to  leave  defences 

in  the  rear.      For  the  first  time  some  prisoners  were 

taken  ;  but  they  turned  out  to  be  composed  of  women, 

of  children,  and  old  men  past  fighting,  who  had  left 

the  town,  pushed  by  the  want  of  food.     As  they  filed 

past  the  soldiers,  a  thrill  of  pity  ran  through  the  ranks, 

for  the  prisoners  seemed  a  band   of  living  skeletons. 

Throughout  the  past  three  months  of  fighting  they 

had  starved,  and  now  could  hardly  drag  themselves 

along.     Women  who  had  been  fierce  viragoes  tottered 

on  their  feet,  leaning  on  sticks,  and  miserable  mothers 

pressed  their  starving  infants  to  their  dried  up  breasts, 

as  they  passed  like  a  drove  of  phantoms  through  the 

camp.    Three  or  four  boys,  of  ten  or  twelve  years  of  age, 

wounded  and  black  with  powder — for  they  had  fought 

beside  their  fathers — drew  themselves  up,  and  tried  to 

swagger  as   they  saw  the  soldiers   looking   at  them. 

The  spectral   procession  gave  an   indication  of  what 

was  passing  in  the  town. 

Still  it  gave  not  a  sign  or  weakness,  and  every 
evening  the  sound  of  litanies  and  hymns  floated  up  to 
the  camp,  where  round  the  fires,  for  the  first  time,  the 
soldiers,  amply  fed  and  cared  for,  listened  with  feel- 
ings of  amazement  to  the  psalmody  that  rose  from 
the  doomed  town. 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  229 

September  opened  disastrously  for  the  besieged. 
At  the  beginning  of  the  month  Pajehu  fell,  pierced  by 
a  chance  shot.  His  death  deprived  the  sectaries  of 
their  most  energetic  leader,  and  the  command  devolved 
on  Macambira  and  Joao  Abade,  who  carried  on  the 
fight  to  the  best  of  their  ability,  but  w^ith  less  genius 
for  guerilla  warfare  than  Pajehu  had  shown.  Early 
in  the  month  the  two  half-finished  towers  of  the 
great  church  were  battered  down,  depriving  the 
besieged  of  their  best  observation  posts,  for  they  had 
towered  above  the  camp. 

Antonio  Conselheiro,  who  had  rarely  left  the  towers 
for  weeks,  except  when  he  came  down  to  animate  his 
followers,  was  nearly  overwhelmed  in  the  fall  of  the 
towers,  but  once  again  escaped.  His  escape  was  set 
down  to  a  miracle,  and  his  brave,  if  misguided, 
followers  still  determined  to  hold  out.  Inside  the 
town  the  battle  was  continuous,  for  the  trenches  ran 
under  the  houses  like  a  rabbit  warren,  and  when  a 
group  of  huts  had  been  destroyed,  the  troops  who 
thought  themselves  secure  found  they  were  exposed 
to  a  hot  fire  from  men  well  hidden  underground,  and 
sheltered  from  attack. 

On  neither  side  was  quarter  given,  and  the  troops 
instantly  cut  the  throats  or  ripped  the  bellies  up  of 
every  prisoner,  knowing  the  one  thing  the  Jagun9os 
feared  was  death  by  steel,  thinking  it  deprived  them 
of  salvation — a  superstition  never  yet  explained.  Thus 
when  the  soldiers  took  a  prisoner  they  asked  him 
generally,  *'  How  do  you  want  to  die  .?" 

The  Jagun9os  always  answered,  "  By  a  rifle  shot." 
Then  with  a  savage  laugh  the  soldiers'  answer  was. 


230  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

"  It  shall  be  by  cold  steel,"  and  plunged  his  knife  into 
his  throat,  bending  the  head  back  as  a  butcher  treats 
a  sheep. 

Each  lane  and  every  house  had  to  be  taken  separ- 
ately, and  women,  children,  and  old  men  fought  by 
the  side  of  the  Jagun^os,  giving  their  lives  as  cheer- 
fully as  the  most  robust  of  the  young.  Terrible 
combats  took  place  underground  in  the  rough  trenches 
and  in  the  huts,  into  which  the  inhabitants  inveigled 
soldiers,  by  counterfeiting  death  and  then  attacking 
them.  Whichever  side  carried  the  day  in  these 
encounters,  the  fate  of  those  defeated  was  assured,  and 
the  long  *' jacare  "  of  the  Jagun^os,  or  the  sword- 
bayonet  of  the  troops,  was  the  sole  arbiter. 

To  all  the  propositions  of  surrender  made  by  the 
Marshal  no  answer  was  returned.  The  prisoners 
refused  to  answer  questions  as  to  the  condition  of  the 
town,  even  to  save  their  lives.  After  refusal  they  were 
slain  inexorably  ;  but  young  and  old  alike  refused 
their  lives,  saying  they  wished  to  follow  their  good 
Councillor  to  heaven,  of  which  they  were  assured. 

Once  more  the  besiegers  tried  a  general  assault, 
furious  to  be  delayed  too  long  by  such  a  miserable 
place.  It  failed  completely,  under  the  terrific  fire 
that  burst  upon  it  from  huts  and  trenches,  churches, 
and  from  the  four  Krupp  guns,  lost  by  the  former 
expedition,  after  its  defeat.  Furious,  the  Marshal  led 
his  forces  back  again,  and  once  again  sat  down  to  draw 
the  investment  tighter  and  to  prevent  provisions  from 
arriving  at  the  town. 

One  gate  of  safety  still  remained  to  the  stubborn 
sectaries.        The  roads  towards  Varzea  da  Ema  and 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  231 

Uaua  still  were  open  to  them.  Provisions  still  came 
in  occasionally,  and  a  supply  of  ammunition  reached 
them,  sent  by  traders  on  the  coast,  following  the 
forest  trails.  By  these,  the  population  could  have 
escaped  to  the  interior,  or  at  the  least  the  leaders  and 
the  able-bodied  men.  Behind  them  was  immunity,  for 
the  Government  could  not  have  followed  them  into 
the  trackless  wilds  of  Matto  Grosso.  Behind  them 
lay  relief  from  hunger,  safety  from  danger,  and  the 
possibility  of  founding  a  new  Zion  remote  from  inter- 
ference, where  they  could  have  lived  and  looked  for 
the  coming  of  the  King,  Don  Sebastian,  and  followed 
their  peculiar  doctrines  in  peace.  So  hard  the 
Government  was  pushed,  even  with  the  larger  forces 
under  Marshal  Bittencourt,  that  probably  they  would 
have  been  willing  to  come  to  a  composition  of  some 
sort  or  other  with  Antonio  Conselheiro,  had  he  but 
made  a  sign.  Neither  he  nor  his  stubborn  followers 
gave  the  sign,  and  what  is  more  remarkable,  none  of 
the  bandits,  thieves,  or  broken  men  who  could  not  be 
supposed  to  have  joined  him  for  rehgious  motives, 
ever  thought  of  an  escape.  Provisions  for  a  time 
came  in  by  the  two  open  roads,  and  a  few  old  men 
and  women  with  their  children  disappeared  along 
them,  into  the  forest  wilds. 

By  the  middle  of  September,  Marshal  Bittencourt 
advanced  and  occupied  both  roads.  Then  he  sent 
in  to  see  if  Antonio  Conselheiro  would  surrender, 
being  well  aware  that  there  was  still  hard  work  before 
him  if  he  should  have  to  reduce  the  place  by  force. 
No  answer  was  returned  to  any  of  his  messages,  and 
the  agony  of  the  Jagun9o  Zion  entered  its  last  phase. 


232  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

Once  more  the  fighting  recommenced.  The  troops 
advanced,  enduring  heavy  losses,  but  always  gaining 
ground.  Men  fought  to  the  last  gasp,  in  trenches,  in 
the  dark  lanes  and  winding  passages.  None  asked  for 
quarter,  and  if  a  prisoner  was  taken  on  either  side,  he 
was  straightway  butchered  like  a  sheep.  The 
wounded  were  slaughtered  as  they  lay,  by  starving 
women  who  crept  out  under  fire  to  drive  a  knife  into 
the  victim's  heart,  content  to  be  shot  down,  so  that, 
as  some  of  them  exclaimed,  "  I  have  dispatched  a  dog 
before  me,  to  prepare  the  way."  The  month  crept 
on,  and  still  Canudos  fought  with  the  courage  of 
despair.  At  last  the  walls  of  the  great  church  were 
battered  down,  depriving  the  Jagun9os  of  their  battery, 
for  on  the  church  the  captured  guns  had  been 
set  up. 

The  inhabitants,  with  true  Indian  stoicism,  hungry 
and  desperate,  and  with  ammunition  running  short, 
kept  on  the  unequal  combat,  fighting  as  desperately 
as  upon  the  first  day  they  were  attacked.  Nothing 
compelled  them,  for  neither  Antonio  Conselheiro  nor 
his  leaders  had  any  special  bodies  of  armed  men  on 
whom  they  could  rely,  nor,  given  the  character  of  the 
Brazilian,  they  probably  would  not  have  applied  com- 
pulsion if  thev  had  had  the  power. 

Hunger  began  to  do  its  work,  and  night  by  night 
miserable  bands  of  women,  their  heads  enveloped  in 
their  white  blankets,  crept  into  the  besiegers'  camp  to 
seek  a  little  food.  They  said  no  word,  they  made  no 
prayer  ;  but  sitting  down  upon  the  ground  with  their 
heads  covered,  patiently  waited  for  whatever  fate  they 
had  to  bear.     Their  appearance  sent  a  thrill  of  pity 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  233 

through  the  troops,  who  shared  their  rations  with 
them,  and  then  advanced  to  the  attack. 

One  by  one,  all  the  chief  leaders  disappeared,  slain 
in  the  trenches,  butchered  in  the  lanes,  or  dead  of 
hunger  and  of  thirst.  Last  of  all,  on  the  22nd  of 
the  month,  Antonio  Conselheiro  died. 

As  he  had  seen  his  hopes  all  vanish  one  by  one — the 
great,  new  town  which  was  to  be  the  centre  of  the 
kingdom  of  Don  Sebastian  battered  to  pieces  and  the 
walls  levelled  with  the  ground,  the  towers  fallen  down, 
the  sacred  image  of  the  Good  Jesus  blown  to  pieces 
by  a  shell,  his  people  starving  and  every  hope 
deceived — he  fell  into  despair.  Wrapping  himself  in 
silence,  he  refused  all  food,  passed  all  the  day  in 
prayer  in  an  angle  of  the  ruined  church  before  an 
image  of  a  saint,  and  stalked  about  the  streets  occasion- 
ally, a  living  skeleton  shrouded  in  mutism. 

One  day,  after  he  had  been  missed  for  several  hours, 
Antonio  Beatinho,  his  inseparable  friend  and  devotee, 
found  him  face  downwards  on  the  ground,  dead  and 
already  cold,  clasping  a  silver  crucifix  against  his 
breast,  within  the  ruined  church.  His  face  was 
calm,  his  body  almost  mere  skin  and  bones,  worn 
out  with  fasting  and  with  the  death  of  his  illusions, 
but  his  soul  unconquerable. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

Antonio  Conselheiro's  death  had  the  effect  of 
rendering  his  followers  still  more  desperate  and  deter- 
mined to  hold  out.  A  legend  soon  gained  ground, 
that  as  he  saw  his  chief  adherents  and  the  best  part 
of  all  his  fighting  men  slain  by  the  enemy,  he  had 
determined  to  accompany  them  as  an  ambassador  to 
God.  He  had  died,  they  said,  to  expiate  their  crimes, 
and  now  was  sitting  at  the  right  hand  of  God,  direct- 
ing the  defence.  Soon,  it  was  rumoured,  he  would 
return  in  glory,  accompanied  by  the  King,  Don 
Sebastian,  and  with  an  escort  of  angels  and  arch- 
angels, all  armed  with  flaming  swords,  to  fight  with 
Anti-Christ. 

All  hearts  were  lightened,  and  in  spite  of  hunger 
and  of  thirst  the  decimated  sectaries  fought  on 
stubbornly.  A  few  deserted,  and  thus  saved 
themselves,  seeking  a  refuge  in  the  impenetrable 
forests,  after  the  hue  and  cry  was  over  returning  to 
their  houses,  where  some  of  them  possibly  still  are 
living,  w^aiting  for  the  millennium  and  for  the  prophet's 
second  coming  upon  earth.  Let  them  live  on,  and 
watch  the  humming-birds  as  they  hang  poised  above 
the  flowers,  the  lizards  basking  in  the  sun,  listen  to 

234 


LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO      235 

the  mysterious  noises  that  at  night  in  the  tropics  rise 
from  the  woods,  inhale  the  scent  of  the  dank  vegeta- 
tion, and  till  their  crops  of  mandioca  and  of  maize. 
That  is  the  true  millennium,  did  they  but  know  it,  and 
each  man  makes  or  mars  it  for  himself,  as  long  as 
health  gives  him  the  power  to  drink  it  in,  and  to 
enjoy. 

These  were  the  last  to  escape  from  the  impending 
doom,  for  in  October  the  investment  lines  were  drawn 
so  strictly  that  not  a  mouse  could  issue  from  the  town. 
From  that  time  the  doom  of  the  besieged  was  sealed, 
and  their  destruction  certain,  if  they  continued  to 
resist.  It  would  have  been  good  policy  to  have  pro- 
claimed an  amnesty,  for  as  Antonio  Conselheiro  and 
their  other  leaders  all  were  dead,  the  people  would 
have  gone  back  to  their  homes  had  they  but  only 
been  assured  of  safety  for  their  lives.  Few 
Governments  are  much  disposed  either  to  pity  or  to 
common  sense,  and  the  Brazilians  were  no  exception  to 
the  rule  that  seems  to  make  republics  and  monarchies 
alike  hating  and  hateful  to  mankind. 

So  once  again  the  struggle  was  begun,  with  varying 
fortunes  all  through  October,  and  bitterness  pushed  to 
the  verge  of  madness  upon  both  sides  reigned  indis- 
criminately. Prisoners  were  taken  and  dragged  before 
the  General,  interrogated,  wrapped  themselves  up  in 
silence,  or  defied  him,  and  in  both  cases  by  a  motion 
of  the  hand  were  sent  out  to  their  death. 

Not  one  of  them  faltered  or  weakened  for  a  mo- 
ment, some  of  them  feeling  the  edges  of  the  knives 
that    were    next    moment    to  be   plunged   into   their 


236  LIFE  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

throats,  with  a  defiant  smile.  The  troops  grew  weary 
of  the  butchery,  but  there  was  no  respite,  and  to  all 
offers  of  surrender  no  answer  was  returned. 

Water  began  to  fail,  and  the  besieged  Jagun^os 
suffered  terribly  from  thirst.  To  get  at  water  for 
their  comrades  and  their  wives,  some  performed  pro- 
digious acts  of  bravery,  creeping  out  under  fire  to  fill 
a  miserable  skin  or  gourd,  at  the  utmost  hazard  of 
their  lives. 

As  each  successive  group  of  huts  was  taken  and 
destroyed,  the  next  resisted  still  more  stubbornly, 
taking  a  heavy  toll  of  killed  and  wounded  from  the 
soldiery.  At  times,  the  hunger-driven  people,  collect- 
ing all  the  men  fit  to  bear  arms,  charged  desperately 
upon  the  troops,  amongst  whose  files  a  feeling  of 
commiseration  grew  for  their  mad  valour  and  their 
contempt  of  death.  All  night  the  artillery  played 
upon  the  town,  lighting  it  up  as  the  shells  set  the 
miserable  huts  afire,  and  battering  down  such  portions 
of  the  church  as  still  were  standing,  destroying  the  last 
points  of  vantage  for  the  sharp-shooters. 

Nothing  could  break  the  resolution  of  the  fast  dis- 
appearing sectaries,  and  when  the  roaring  of  the  guns 
was  stilled,  the  long-drawn  notes  of  psalms  were 
wafted  through  the  night,  but  now  more  fitfully,  like 
the  lost  souls  in  purgatory,  raising  a  cry  for  help. 

To  the  repeated  messages  sent  by  the  Marshal  for 
surrender  still  no  answer  was  returned,  even  an  offer 
of  an  armistice  was  only  used  by  the  Jagun9os  to  send 
out  a  crowd  of  starving  women,  who,  headed  by 
Antonio  Beatinho,  defiled  like  phantoms  through  the 


ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO  237 

camp,  victims  for  months  of  hunger  and  thirst.  The 
fighting  men  retired  still  deeper  into  the  dark  recesses 
of  the  lanes,  and  kept  up  a  hot  fire  upon  the  troops 
with  their  last  cartridges. 

Days  passed,  days  which  must  have  been  weeks  to 
the  pent-up  defenders  of  the  town,  cooped  in  their 
trenches  and  their  rifle-pits.  Throughout  October 
the  miserable  butchery  dragged  on,  until  at  last,  on 
the  5th  of  November,  1897,  all  was  as  silent  as  the 
grave.  No  shots  were  fired  from  the  smoking  heaps 
of  ruins,  and  not  a  hymn  was  raised  by  the  Jagun^os 
to  their  lost  Councillor.  The  soldiers,  fearing  an 
ambuscade,  advanced,  passing  by  trenches  filled  to  the 
top  with  dead,  and  through  the  lanes,  strewn  thick 
with  corpses  lying  as  they  fell,  some  at  the  door  of 
their  own  huts,  and  others  with  their  faces  in  the 
mud-holes  towards  which  they  had  crept  to  seek 
a  little  water  in  their  agony. 

All  the  Jagun9os  had  joined  their  Councillor.  From 
the  last  trench  the  soldiers  received  the  fire  of  the  few 
last  defenders  of  Canudos,  faithful  to  the  death.  Two 
boys,  one  able-bodied  man,  and  an  old  veteran,  still 
fought  on  until  a  volley  from  the  soldiers  laid  them  at 
rest,  their  faces  turned  towards  the  foe. 

Under  a  covering  of  earth,  in  a  grave,  shallow,  and 
dug  in  haste,  the  conquerers,  after  a  search,  came  on 
the  body  of  Antonio  Conselheiro.  Dressed  in  his  long, 
blue  tunic,  his  hands  crossed  piously,  clasping  a  cruci- 
fix against  his  breast,  he  lay,  waiting  the  coming  of 
the  King,  that  Don  Sebastian  who  he  believed  should 
come  to  rule  the  world  in  glory,  blot  out  injustice. 


238      LIFE  OF  ANTONIO  CONSELHEIRO 

cast  down  the  mighty,  and  exalt  the  poor  in  spirit, 
giving  them  the  world  as  their  inheritance. 

Some  of  the  faithful  had  placed  some  withered 
flowers  upon  his  breast.  His  body  lay  upon  a 
ragged  piece  of  matting,  and  both  his  eyes  were 
full  of  sand. 


BILLING   AND   SONS,    LTD.,    PRINTERS,    GUILDFORD,    ENGLAND 


M 


:VENTS  IN  THE  BOOK  TOOK  PLACE 


N       A       IVI      B       (J 


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